


Over The Edge

by Darby_Harper



Category: Rammstein
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Drugged Sex, M/M, revenge is a dish best served cold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-07
Updated: 2017-05-08
Packaged: 2018-10-28 23:27:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 9
Words: 24,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10841679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darby_Harper/pseuds/Darby_Harper
Summary: An incident at a video shoot for Emigrate's new album drags one of Richard’s best-hidden secrets into the light, and Christoph must figure out how to solve its mystery before it destroys his lover completely.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This tale appeared here many moons ago, and after a major re-write and re-edit, here it is.
> 
>  
> 
> **Any similarity between the fictional version of the person portrayed here and the actual person is purely coincidental. This is a work of fiction. This is not an attempt to defame the character of said person on the basis of libel, as the work is FICTIONAL (and NOT an intently false statement created with the express purpose of misleading others about the actual character of said person). All rights reserved.**

I used to think that the nightmares my lover had on a nearly-nightly basis were the results of a not-so-nice childhood and an incident when he was older involving the Stasi, but after what happened two days ago, it's no longer so. So now I’m huddled on our bed, my shaking, terrified-out-of-his mind beloved curled in my arms, drifting in and out of a medication-induced sleep. I’m afraid to move, else Richard will wake up and freak out again, but if I don’t hit the bathroom soon, my back teeth are going to float.

“Reesh?” I whisper, brushing my lover’s hair from his eyes. He peers up at me through swollen, red eyes and whimpers softly. “Reesh, I gotta take a pee like _now_. I’ll only be gone for a couple of moments, okay? I’m not going to leave you.”

“Think I’d better come too. All that water and Gatorade’s gone right through me,” he croaks. I release him from my arms and we stagger towards the bathroom, both of us bone-tired and wobbly-legged. I get everything done quickly so I can keep an eye on Richard to make sure he doesn’t pass out and hit the floor. Once he’s done, we make our way back to bed; this time he gives me a moment to peel out of my sweaty, wrinkled clothes and help him out of his. I don’t care that we’re naked; all I want to do is lie down and close my eyes for just a while. Richard clambers into the bed and curls into my side, resting his head on my shoulder and slinging an arm around me. I can tell he was halfway to sleep before he hit the mattress; he’s now breathing deeply and the arm around my waist is heavy. It doesn’t take long before my eyelids grow heavy and I drift off, the events of the past 48 hours replaying like a bad movie in my head.

::

I hadn’t seen Richard in a couple of days; he was working his ass off on the new Emigrate album and the video for the first song off of the album. I’d been a little upset at first that he was choosing to stay in downtown Berlin rather than make the half hour trek back to our flat every evening but knowing my beloved as I did, I figured his hotel room was nothing more than a place to dump his gear and maybe get a couple of hours sleep before heading back to the studio. He’d been moody as hell the last time I’d talked to him; I could tell he was tired and wanted to come home but was going to be his usual stubborn self and see the project through even if he ran himself down to nothing and fell asleep standing up when all was said and done.

“I wish you were here,” he’d said, a yawn distorting his voice during one of our pre-bedtime phone calls. “My back is killing me and you’re the one person that can get the knots out of it and not punch my spine through my chest.”

“Poor baby,” I sighed, rattling the ice in my glass of water. “Hey, why don’t I come down tomorrow and visit? You’re all but done with the video, yeah?”

“Can you? Oh man, sweetheart, that would be awesome!” Richard replied, his voice becoming cheery and bright again. “I’ve missed you so much even though you’re only a half hour away from here.”

“I _could_ be persuaded to spend the night too,” I purred. “That is if you don’t have any other plans, like, oh, working around the clock till you pass out.”

“For you, my love, I’ll clear my calendar. Especially if you bring some…ahem…toys and treats along.”

“I think I could manage that,” I replied, feeling a warm tingle dance through my nerves. “Anything special, or do you want me to surprise you?”

I heard someone yelling in the background for Richard to get off the phone and back to work. “Ah, shit, I gotta run. Surprise me. Baby, I’m sorry to cut you off but…”

“I know how things are. Go do your thing and I’ll see you tomorrow around noon,” I said, anticipation making my head spin. As we rung off, I chuckled evilly to myself, saying, “Surprise you, eh? Oh my dear, sweet Reesh, you’re going to be _quite_ surprised…”

Traffic the next morning around the city center was unusually heavy; I got to the site where Richard and the rest of Emigrate were filming the video later than I’d wanted to be. The forbidding, grey building that rose up against the somber, rainy sky made me shiver. I wasn’t sure what it had once been used for but it literally reeked of old pain, sadness, and depression. From what Richard had told me, the entire inside had been gutted to the bare brick walls, then areas partitioned off for use in video or photographic shoots. I pulled up into the small parking area near the back door and slid out of my car, pulling my jacket closer to me to keep the cold air that whipped around the buildings from freezing me down to the bone.

The back door was guarded by a security guard tucked away in a little booth; I told him who I was and who I wanted to see and he ushered me through the heavy steel door just as a strong wind blew by and shoved us both inside the building. He rolled his eyes at the wind, pulling a pass out of his jacket pocket and handing it to me, saying, “I’d swear this is January but the calendar says it’s May.”

I clipped the pass onto the bottom of my heavy, black jacket and said, “I had to check my calendar this morning that we suddenly hadn’t been transported back to Winter. Where’s the video shoot going on?”

The guard pointed over my shoulder to a fire door that had seen better days. It was covered with flaking, dirty white paint and didn’t quite fit into the frame. “Go through that door and turn right. The shoot is at the end of the hallway. I’d keep my jacket on, it’s cold down there.” I thanked the guard, zipped up my jacket all the way and made my way through the door and down the frigid hallway. By the time I reached the area of the building that had been set up for the video shoot, I was blowing on my fingers and muttering about global warming. There was no notice on the door that I needed to stay out, so I carefully pushed the door open and slipped inside, peering about for Richard.

“Hey Christoph!” he called, popping out from behind a heavy light. While we didn’t run towards each other, Richard practically bounced over to greet me while I stood in place and waited for him to reach me. He grabbed me into a breath-stealing hug and dropped a kiss on my forehead; I managed to brush a kiss along lips quickly before he all but dragged me over to the set. “You have to see this!” he crowed. I followed along, feeling very much like a child’s toy being dragged along by its leash, trying to greet the people I passed by and not trip over my feet, cables, packing boxes or loose bits of unidentifiable things. We reached our destination without me wiping out; Richard stood aside, pointing to a mockup of a padded cell. I came to a stumbling halt, blinked at the set and said, “It’s…a padded room. Are we converting one room of our place into a padded room and this is how it’ll look when it’s done?”

“No, goofball. I’m supposed to be a patient in a mental hospital and the rest of the band are gonna walk by the door, peek in the window and walk away. Or something like that. That’s not the cool part,” he said, lifting his chin up so I could see that instead of his usual indigo-cobalt blue eyes, he was wearing contacts that turned them a glossy, royal blue, almost like the vampire’s eyes in the “Underworld” movies. “I kinda like ‘em. I originally wanted those freaky white lenses like I used to wear but these look better. Everyone else has the white lenses, so it looks really cool. I’d show you some of the footage we shot yesterday but the director’s being a hard-ass about not letting anyone outside us and the crew see it.”

By that point, a skinny, rat like little man dressed in layers of grey and eye-bleeding yellow parka and almost-sneer plastered on his ugly face. He set off every warning bell I had and I was surprised Richard wasn’t showing any signs of wanting the person booted off the set. Instead he nodded at me and said, “This is Vadim Parizikoff. The label and management liked his work, so here he is.” I didn’t make a move to shake the creepy man’s hand; I stood with my arms folded and hands shoved into my armpits.

“Hi,” I muttered, stepping a little closer to Richard and sort-of putting myself between him and the video director. He peered up at me through thick, soda bottle bottom lenses and rasped, “Oh, you must be Christoph Schneider! I’m pleased to meet you. Let me borrow your ...friend for a bit, yes? I promise to give him back unharmed.”

I had no choice; I gave Richard’s shoulder a quick squeeze and watched him follow the director over to a gigantic rolling cart that was laden with computer equipment, monitors, and cables snaking everywhere. I found a rickety stool in the corner and perched on it, watching my lover listen to Vadim and my stomach twisting with nerves. A cute young lady wearing a pass around her neck that said “Filmtech” came over to me, asking if I needed anything and I said quietly, “Have you ever worked with this...Vadim...before? I’ve never heard of him.”

She turned her back to the set and pretended to fiddle with her iPad, her voice pitched low so only I could hear her. “He’s supposed some new hot-shot video director out of England, and his name’s Stan Miller, not Vadim something-or-other. That Russian name and accent is as fake as you can get. I guess he did videos for fashion shows or television ads, I’m not sure. All I know is Jonas Åkerlund was supposed to have this gig and suddenly, he didn’t. I signed on just to work with Jonas, not this twit. I don’t know what the record label’s thinking. I know he and Joe Letz have nearly gotten into a fight a couple of times over what he wanted him to do. How Richard’s keeping his temper I have no idea.”

 _Someone got under Joe’s skin that much?_ I thought to myself. To keep the tech from getting into trouble, I said, “Can you do a couple things for me? One, if Joe’s around, tell him I’m here and I need to talk to him. And if you don’t mind, I’d like a bottle of water.”

The tech smiled at me, ruffling her platinum blonde pixie cut and said, “Anything. My name’s Sarah, yell if you need anything else.” She cat-footed across the creaky wooden floor and vanished through a door across from the set, leaving me to gnaw on my fingers and wonder why I was half-scared out of my wits. Sarah returned in less than five minutes, winding her way through people, equipment and cables, a bottle of water in one hand and Joe padding along behind her. His eyes lit up when he saw me and we exchanged greetings while Sarah pulled up a short stepladder up for Joe and handed me my water. She left us sitting in the dim light from the windows; once I was sure she was gone, I said to Joe, “What the hell is going on here? I’ve heard you and the director almost came to blows, I’m sick to my stomach from nerves and I have no clue why.”

Joe pulled up the hood of his jacket, covering his streaky black hair and hiding his face from the light. “Fucker’s got some nerve, Schneider,” he said, bouncing his left foot up and down the way I was doing with my right. “I don’t mind the makeup, the creepy costumes but slamming Reesh around, smacking him, screaming at him? It’s not cool. This ain’t like the shoot we did for “Eat You Alive.” This guy’s a vicious little bastard and yeah, he’s got my perv-o-meter going off loud and clear. “The loony bin idea’s a good one, but he’s got Richard getting bounced off the walls. You haven’t seen any of the stuff we’ve shot so far, have you?”

I shook my head no, leaning down at Joe’s gesture so he could show me something on his cell phone. “This is the stuff I managed to get before that dick saw me and screamed his head off for me to stop taping. You’re not going to like it.”

What I saw on that tiny video screen turned my stomach inside out. Curled in the corner of the padded room, in a bloodstained straightjacket and bondage trousers, feet bare, his hair a mess and black eye makeup smudged down his face was Richard. He was staring into the camera with a defiant look, one eye blacked and those odd blue eyes shining out of an unusually pale face. There was a tiny dribble of dried blood at the corner of his mouth and his lower lip was split. There wasn’t any sound to go with the video, thankfully, so Joe could show me the short clip and no one be the wiser. The video blanked for a second, then showed Richard being hoisted up by his arms by people in faceless masks and dragged down a long hallway, unable to walk thanks to the leg straps on the trousers being pulled short. The blank-faced attendants flung him down the hallway; thankfully Richard knew how to fall properly and while it looked like the tumble was a bad one, I could tell he’d rehearsed the whole thing and wasn’t hurt.

Joe clicked the phone off and looked up at me. “Yeah, that’s the tamer stuff. There’s one part where Vadim’s off camera, screaming all kinds of shit at Richard, and he’s cowering in the corner like a whipped dog. Schneider, I know it’s not real but this isn’t right. If I didn’t know better, Reesh is scared shitless of him.”

My temper was just this side of boiling when I heard someone yell for Joe to get into makeup, so he stood up, saying, “I hope you’re going to be here awhile, maybe you can keep our lovely director from killing your sweetheart---and my friend. Something nasty’s going on, I know it.” And with that Joe trotted away from me, leaving me to sit and shake. I wasn’t sure how much pressure I could put on anyone as this was Richard’s project, not a Rammstein project, but I certainly wasn’t going to sit by and watch some no-name “director” have my beloved thrown around like a sack of beans.

I sat and stewed over what I wanted to do, what I’d seen, and was getting ready to go look for Richard and ask him what the hell was going on when he came up to me and plopped down on the stepladder that Joe had vacated. I looked up and almost fell off my stool; Richard was in full makeup and costume, except the straps on the jacket and pants were undone. He grinned at me and said, “I saw Joe over here with you. What did you two talk about?”

“Uh...drummer stuff,” I stammered, trying not to gape at how awful Richard looked. If I hadn’t known it was all paint, powder, and fake blood, I’d have been dragging him out of the building at warp speed for the nearest hospital. “By the way, how much of this is your idea? You look pretty roughed up.”

“Well...the insane asylum idea was mine, kinda nicked it from the “Mein Hertz Brennt” video. But the rest of it is Vadim’s. It looks really fantastic, fits in with the song, and all the getting bashed about and such, that’s all been planned out so no one gets hurt,” Richard explained, fiddling with the hem of the straightjacket and not looking at me. I knew that mannerism; Richard wasn’t telling me everything and no amount of cajoling, threatening or pleading would get anything out of him. I sighed, put my arm around his shoulders and said, “You’re not comfortable with this, are you?”

“No one is, really,” he replied. “Joe threw a huge fit when Vadim wanted him to slam me up on the wall and scream in my face, so he told Joe to do the throwing and he’d do the screaming. It wasn’t pleasant, let me tell you.”

“I thought Jonas was supposed to be directing this?”

“He was but the label said he didn’t want to do it, so they called in this dude,” Richard said. “And what’s weird is I _know_ Jonas said he’d be more than happy to do the video but when I tried to talk to him on the phone about all this, he hung up on me and hasn’t answered any of the e-mail I’ve sent.”

Now I _knew_ something wasn’t right. Jonas was one of the more easy-going video directors we’d worked with and for him to blow Richard off like that was not like him. I made a mental note to call him as soon as I could and went back to sitting quietly at Richard’s side, my right pinky finger twined with the pointer finger on his left hand. I wanted so badly to say something but I couldn’t think of anything that made sense or didn’t make me sound like I was being the bitchy boyfriend. Richard was too quiet himself; when Vadim called him over to the set, he reluctantly let go of my fingers.

“All right folks, this is the last shot of the day and the last one for the video,” Vadim said, waving his arms around like a windmill. “I want this to be a closed set, only the people who have to be here can stay.”

The look Richard shot me across the room was a cross between indignant and run-screaming-for-the-hills panicky. “Closed set? What the hell?” he asked, the merest hint of nervousness in his voice. “This wasn’t part of the discussion when you showed us the story boards.”

“I’ve got a great idea to wrap this whole thing up, Richard. Trust me, okay?”

“Wait a second. What are you going to do?”

“We’re going to have the actors who tossed you down the hallway yesterday pick you up and drop you on a stretcher, that’s all,” Vadim cajoled. “The reason I want the closed set is I know some videos and pictures have gotten out and I don’t want anything else going on the Internet. It’s the last shoot of the day, c’mon Richard.”

“Can you give me a couple of minutes?” Richard asked, glancing in my direction. I nodded quickly; once Richard was back with me, I said, “I’ve got to run to the bathroom. I’ll be back in a minute, okay?”

“Okay. Sweetheart, am I overreacting? None of this whole shoot has felt right to me,” Richard said, his eyes wide and scared under the makeup and contact lenses. I stomped my feelings of unease into the dirt and said, “I don’t know. Maybe it’s this building. God only knows what it used to be. It’s been giving me the creeps since I got here.” I dropped a kiss on the top of Richard’s head, found the friendly tech, Sarah, got directions to the bathroom and headed off at a near-trot, wanting to get back to the set before anything else went on. As I finished washing my hands, a knock sounded on the bathroom door and Sarah called in an urgent voice, “You need to get out here and now.”

“Huh?” I asked, stepping into the main room and nearly running over Sarah who was hovering at the door. “What’s wrong?”

“Don't ask, shut up and run,” Sarah replied, grabbing my jacket sleeve and towing me along behind her.

Something in my gut told me Richard was in a bad spot, and I went running for the set as fast as I could. When I hit the door, it was locked from the inside and I almost pulled my wrist out of place as I tried to yank the door open. My heart was pounding like mad as I gave the knob another jerk, then my heart all but stopped when I heard a scream coming from inside that sounded like a damned soul crying out from the pits of Hell. It was the most unholy, terrifying noise I’d ever heard and I knew I’d go to my grave hearing it in my nightmares.

“Richard! What the fuck...!” I heard Joe yelling from behind me. “Schneider, what the hell’s going on?”

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

The door popped open and Vadim tumbled out, a huge red spot on his face turning rapidly black and blue, his bloody nose canted off in an odd angle. He said not a word to anyone, he snatched up his jacket and a messenger bag that had been under it and ran like the hounds of Hell were on his ass. I ran into the room and found Richard curled in the corner of the padded room, tears streaming down his face and his eyes blank and unseeing. Pushing away the curious onlookers who were doing nothing to help him, I knelt next to my beloved, saying, “Reesh, baby, what’s wrong? What happened?”

No answer. I put my arms around him, pulling him into my chest despite him staying stiff as a board. I glared up at the small crowd and snapped, “Someone had better start talking about what happened in here and start talking now, or I’m going to start cracking heads. _NOW_ , damn it!”

Sarah, the ever reliable, shoved her way over to us and said, “Vadim asked Richard what his worst fear was and he told him. Next thing I know, he’s got a couple of extras hauling him kicking and screaming up onto that stretcher over there and strapping him down. He was going to have Richard gagged and blindfolded but he sat up just as Vadim was going over to the stretcher and kicked the crap out of him. Then he...well...”

Every bit of strength I had ran out of me like water and I slumped down, still holding Richard as gently as I could. I started shaking, from exhaustion or my own fright, I don’t know. All I knew was I had to get Richard off that set, out of the building and somewhere quiet and safe or we’d be visiting him in a real mental hospital. Once again, Sarah saved the day by ordering people about, telling some of them to kick the press off the lot, some to wait for her to tell them what to do about the set, and Joe to find Richard’s things and put them in my car. I threw him the keys, hoping I’d flung them in the right direction, then went back to holding Richard, forcing my tears of anger and despair back. I could have my own break down later.

The next several minutes were a blur of faces, people, noise, and commotion. I stayed where I was, Richard curled in my arms and still not speaking to anyone. Someone had brought us a blanket and I had wrapped him up in it, hoping between that and my own body heat he’d start to relax and not stay in the frozen, bone-aching ball of misery he’d become. I murmured to him off and on, telling him that I loved him, that I was there and I wasn’t going to leave him, he could come back now and I’d be waiting for him. Nothing I said made a difference.

“Chris?” Joe said softly from over my shoulder. “Sarah’s gone to find the medic that’s supposed to be on set. D’ya want me to stay with you two till then?”

 nodded, unsure of my voice at the moment. Joe patted my shoulder and settled down beside me, staring at the floor between his shoes. “I should have known something shitty was going down,” he muttered angrily.

“ _How?”_

“I dunno. Well, maybe I do. We’d gone into this video shoot expecting Jonas to be the director, right? I was in the room with Richard when he was talking to Jonas and all was sunshine and puppies. They’d already talked to the record label and management before that, and it seemed everything was okay. The very next day, Richard gets this really pissed off phone call from Jonas. I don’t know what they said because he took it outside the control room, but when he came back Richard looked like he was going to rip someone’s heart out through their nose. He called it a day and shut himself in one of the offices for hours, and a few times I heard him yelling his head off. I wasn’t going to butt into it, yanno? Maybe I should have. Maybe we’d have a clue as to why we ended up dealing with this idiot of a director and what he did to scare Richard so badly.”

Sighing, I shifted my weight a little and let my head thump gently against the wall behind me. “I know what scared him. I don’t know if it’s my place to say anything, but…”

“Then don’t. Richard will tell us eventually what’s wrong,” Joe said.

I don’t like being sneak attacked. And tied down,” a croaking whisper came from my sweetheart’s scream-roughened throat. “Had it happen to me a couple times when I was little. Once it was my…mother’s second husband trying to teach me a lesson. Then getting arrested and beaten up back in ’89 made it worse. It’s a control thing.” A red blush spread its way up Richard’s neck and face, which told me he was ashamed and embarrassed to admit such fear. As I knew so very well, he didn’t have any trouble with being tied up, blindfolded, whatever, just as long as he had some semblance of control, and we all knew never to startle him when he was half awake or tired. Paul had once and so had I; we’d had black eyes and bloody noses to show for that bit of forgetfulness. But this wasn’t all due to the explanation Richard gave Joe, there was something crueler, darker lying in the back of his eyes that I had no clue to. I thought I knew my partner well, now I was starting to wonder how much I really _did_ know.

“It’s okay Richard,” Joe said quietly. “If I’d known what that asshole was going to pull, I’d have insisted on staying on set and you know Schneider would have too.”

Richard sighed deeply and snuggled up under my chin. I could feel his body relaxing into sleep but I knew there would be more tears, anger and who knew what else on the way later. I closed my eyes and said, “That Vadim, Stan, whatever-the-fuck his name is better be on a fast plane to Brazil ‘cause when I get my hands on him, there’s not gonna be enough left of him to scrape up with a butter knife.”

The medic Sarah had gone to find showed up a few moments later. He was a sparrow-like older fellow with bright eyes and a fluffy cap of grey hair around his head. With gentle hands and a calming tone to his voice, he got Richard awake and talking while I carefully took the special effects contacts out of his eyes. The medic didn’t ask exactly what had set him off, he listened to Richard’s quiet, halting explanation of what had happened up to the point that he couldn’t remember anything other than being jerked off his feet and flung through the air.

“I insist that you go home right now,” the medic said, quickly shining a light in Richard’s eyes. “I’m going to give you a very mild sedative, just enough for a couple doses. Call your family doctor either tomorrow or the next and tell him or her what happened. It sounds to me like you’ve had your back wrenched up nicely.”

Startled, I looked up at the medic, knowing without words that he'd been nearby and knew exactly what had happened. He was trying to protect Richard as much as he could by lying, and I gave him a quick, short nod. The medic handed a tiny envelope to me that held a couple of tiny, yellow tablets which I tucked into my jeans pocket. He shook my hand and went to talk to Sarah, leaving me and Joe alone with Richard.

“Come on Reesh, let’s get you out of here,” I said, trying to pull him to his feet and failing. Richard had gone back to his near-comatose state and moving him was like trying to drag a mountain out of its socket in the Earth. Joe pushed me aside and scooped Richard up like he weighed nothing, making sure a bit of the blanket was pulled over his face. “Run and get your car. I’ll bring Reesh down and get him squared away, don’t you worry.” I wasn’t about to ask how Joe could haul Richard up into his arms like a puppy; I took to my heels and ran for the parking lot. Once I was in my car, I had to stop and catch my breath, force back my own screaming and sobbing. Scrubbing my face harshly with my hands, I managed to get the car over to the tiny alcove that Joe was hidden in and threw the passenger side door open, not caring that it panged off the brick wall. Joe tucked Richard into the seat, got the belts around him snugly, and said, “Get him home. Call me when things calm down.” He shut the door and gestured wildly for me to get going and I did, my hands cold and shaking on the steering wheel the whole way back to our apartment.

By the time I’d avoided half the paparazzi in Berlin, Richard was semi-awake but very groggy. He coughed harshly and asked, “What the hell...Chris, when did you get here?”

“We’re going home and I’ll tell you when we get there,” I replied, keeping one eye on the rearview mirror and the other on the road. I’d managed to sneak past the last clump of reporters and photographers and our way home was clear but one never knew. Thankfully the street our place was on was a relatively mundane one, the only way you knew that the real estate didn’t come cheaply was maybe a sleek sports car like mine or that the gardens were a bit more fanciful than the normal. Our apartment building had a benefit that I’d hit on immediately; a two-car garage that attached to the back of the building that was devoted to mine and Richard’s cars. Once inside, I hit the “close door” button on the remote for the garage door that was set into the visor on my side of the car and made sure it was locked both electronically and with the old-fashioned heavy bar of iron across the main locking mechanism. I helped Richard out of his seat and into the house and once I had him sitting on the bed, knelt at his feet, and said, “Tell me what happened, _Liebling_.”

“Can I have some water first?”

“Anything. I’ll be right back.”

When I came back into our bedroom, Richard had kicked off his boots and was staring listlessly down at the floor. I cleared my throat just loud enough to get his attention and not frighten him into another panic attack. He looked up and sort-of smiled at me, thanking me softly for the glass of ice water I handed him. His hands shook badly and I kept my hands around his so he wouldn’t spill the water everywhere. He drained the glass in one long swallow and gave it back to me with a deep sigh that turned rapidly into a sob. Biting the back of his hand, he sniffled, “Damn it, I’m not gonna cry anymore over this shit!”

I pulled the rocking chair that sat near the bedroom window over to the side of the bed and sat down, taking Richard’s hands in mine. “You need to get this out of your system, baby,” I replied. “Crying, throwing things, whatever. You bottle this up and you’re going to explode.”

Jerking his hands out of mine, he stood up from the bed and stomped across the room to the bathroom, shedding his costume as he went. I stood up to follow him and was stopped dead in my tracks when I saw the huge bruises on his shoulders, along his neck and one bad, bad bruise on his left hip. I stared at him, my heart in my throat, trying to figure out what to say, if anything. I couldn’t move for the longest time; the only thing that broke my paralysis was when I saw that the black eye I thought had been makeup turned out to be the real thing. I wouldn’t have noticed had Richard not been scrubbing away at his face, trying to wipe the greasepaint off from around his eyes and only one eye smudging. I hurried into the bathroom, grabbed his arms despite the fear he would haul back and punch me, and yelled, “ _Who did this to you?_ Who was it? Tell me, goddamn it!”

Richard’s eyes rolled back in his head as he dropped into a dead faint; I was glad I had a good grip on his biceps else I’d not been able to catch him before he hit the floor. I lowered him to the floor, slowly, scared out of my mind that I’d done more damage to him by screaming my head off when I should have been staying calm. He wasn’t out for more than half a second and when he woke, the tears started falling again. This time Richard didn’t force them back, he crawled up into my arms and wept like I’d never heard him do so in all the years I’d known him. I wriggled out of my jacket and tucked it around him, then began rocking him back and forth, murmuring softly to him, occasionally kissing his hair or forehead. We stayed on the bathroom floor for I don’t know how long and when Richard finally managed to hiccup himself to a stop, my ass was numb and my feet were asleep. I didn’t care, all that mattered was Richard.

“I need to tell you something,” he said around sniffles. I fumbled around until I could grab the roll of toilet paper out of its holder and handed it to him so he could blow his nose. Once that was taken care of, I moved out of his arms and got up to shake the feeling back into my feet and behind as well as get a wash cloth soaked with cold water for his face. Handing it back down to Richard, I sat down on the side of the tub and said, “What is it?”

Richard took his time before he spoke again, working on wiping more of the stage makeup off and finally draping the wet rag across his eyes. “I wasn’t completely truthful with you guys when I told you why I can’t stand being grabbed from behind unless I sorta know what’s going on.”

“You said it came out of your childhood and your arrest back in ‘89,” I replied.

“It’s more than just that, Christoph. Right after Caron and I finally split up, right before I decided to move back home, I was in a bad place. Really bad. Started hanging around with people that now I wouldn’t cross the street to piss on if they were on fire. I was doing anything I could smoke, swallow or snort on top of drinking from the time I got up till the time I passed out.”

“I got invited to a party in uptown Manhattan one weekend by some chick I knew through the party circuit and since it was with people I kinda-sorta knew, I got fucked up worse than I had in months. The last thing I remember was standing in the garden of the apartment the party was in, just in my pants and nothing else and being told to “run little rabbit, run.” I thought it was a joke, so I stood there until this guy that was every inch as big as till is came swinging a baseball bat at my head. I took off running and that’s where things get blurry.”

I held my breath, watching Richard’s lovely indigo eyes go unfocused as he tried to dredge up years-old memories. “I kind of remember being tackled and ending up face down in the rosebushes. I came up swinging but…I went from the rosebush to being thrown down on a tabletop. I’m sure I hit my head. I remember looking up, trying to sit up and getting slammed back down on the tabletop.” He reached around to the back of his head, threading his fingers through his gel-hardened hair and said, “I have a scar back there somewhere, I didn’t get the cut sewed up in time to keep it from scarring.” I slowly reached up and felt the spot myself, wincing at the length and how bumpy it was after all this time. I’d never commented on it, figuring it was a relic of Richard’s six days “visit” with the Stasi. He took a breath and murmured, “Like I said, a lot of what happened is a blur. But I know that…Christoph, I…I was…”

I got cold all over, then hot, then so nauseated I had to scramble for the toilet before I threw up on Richard. He didn’t have to complete his sentence, I knew what he was going to say. That I hadn’t seen the haunted, broken and shamed look in his eyes when he’d looked up at me at the video shoot, upset me horribly. I’d always prided myself on being hyper-sensitive to everyone around me, especially my lovers and family and not seeing those emotions in Richard’s eyes earlier hurt me so much. It was Richard’s turn to take care of me, putting a cold wash cloth on the back of my neck and making sure I didn’t pitch into the toilet. When I was done, I clambered to my feet to rinse my mouth out and scrub my teeth clean to get the acrid nastiness out of my mouth. Richard took my hand and led me back to the bedroom where we curled up on top of the covers with me spooned around him for warmth and comfort. The silence dragged on for too long before I could speak without my voice cracking.

“Did they use protection?” I said.

“Oh yeah, they were quite careful about that. Even the women.”

“How…how many…”

Richard sighed and pulled on my arm till I was all but draped over him. “My best guess is ten people. How many times I have no clue but I was at that apartment for three days, that much I know.”

“Richard…oh shit, love, I’m so sorry, I had no idea,” I babbled. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it took me three years to come to grips with what happened and another year of therapy before I felt safe again. I would have told you but it’s…”

“Shush. I know you would have told me eventually,” I said to my beloved, nuzzling his hair and giving his hand a gentle squeeze. “If you can tell me without getting too upset, what happened on the set that made you freak out so badly?”

ichard turned around in my embrace and rested his head against my chest. He took a deep breath and said, “That director? The second my back hit the stretcher, he said, “Hello my little rabbit. Run, little bunny, run.”

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

I used to have a horrid temper when I was younger. My 2-year stint in the military didn’t help much and only until I started taking yoga to strengthen my back did I learn how to control my temper. Not to say that I didn’t have times when I lost it and blew up like a nuclear warhead, but at least I wasn’t punching holes in walls anymore. 

_However._

Right now, I could’ve punched through several brick walls and not felt an iota of pain. The slow burn of rage filled my veins as I held a shuddering, sniffling Richard in my arms. If that rat-faced little prick of a video director had been nearby, I’d have torn him to pieces with my bare hands and teeth, and not given a flying fuck about the consequences. I forced myself to breathe through my nose, slowly, knowing that I needed to keep myself as calm as possible. Richard needed me and as I’d said to myself earlier, my nervous breakdown could wait.

 “You don’t think he was there that night, do you?” I asked, surprised that my voice was so calm despite the anger that was making me sick.

 “I...I don’t know. I don’t remember faces that well as it is; being out of my mind on drugs and scared shitless on top of that? I’m surprised I remembered what little I did.”

 “Didn’t you go to the police?” I said, curling around Richard as much for my own comfort as his. “Wait. Scratch that. I know why you didn’t go.”

 “I did, sort of,” he replied, weaving his long fingers through the belt loops on my jeans. “I called the lawyer that handled my divorce and asked for advice; he sent me along to one of his friends who’d been a New York City detective till he retired. Between the two of them, they talked me into going to the hospital and get taken care of, then a couple of days later, the police got an anonymous letter telling them that I’d been a guest at their party and had been beaten up and raped multiple times because I’d been drugged. From that point on I don’t know what else happened but I found out over the next couple of years that most of the people who’d been at that party had either been arrested on other charges, and a couple of them were in prison for raping underage girls.  As much as I didn’t want to, I started into therapy for a few months. I had to or I’d have gone insane.”

 “Reesh...I don’t know what to say. Just...I wish you would have told us, or at least me. You know we would have understood.”

 “Why I couldn’t tell you or anyone else...I wanted to but I was afraid you’d push me away, that everyone else would…”

 “Reesh, you know all of us better than that! We love you, me more so than anyone else! I wouldn’t have pushed you away, said anything cruel to you!” I howled. “I love you, you vain little peacock! Even when I wasn’t “in love” with you, I loved you as part of my family, one of my best friends! You _know_ me, Richard!”

 I tried to choke back the tears but couldn’t; I gave up and gathered my sweetheart to me and just cried till I had not a drop of energy left. Richard held me through all of it, saying nothing, just holding on to me and letting me cry myself out. Before long, my eyelids were drooping shut; I tried as hard as I could to stop them but couldn’t. Richard must have felt my struggle for he laughed softly and said, “Let’s take a nap. We both need it.”

 The jangling, raucous sound of the ring tone I’d assigned to Till’s phone number jerked me out of the lovely mindlessness of the deep sleep I’d fallen into. I came awake, flailing about, trying to slap a non-existent alarm clock to shut it up and realizing the second before I went sailing off the bed that it was my mobile phone ringing, not an alarm clock. I hit the carpet with a yelp, waking Richard up, and fumbled in my jeans pockets till I found my mobile. Still half awake, I said, “What do you want, Till? You’d better be fighting off a zombie horde and need help.”

 “Joe Letz called me about an hour ago, I’m coming over.”

 “No! Uh, Till, we’re fine, no need to come over,” I stammered, meeting Richard’s panicked gaze. He flailed his hands, trying to tell me to convince Till not to come over to the apartment and add to the craziness of the day.

 “Put Richard on the phone, Christoph. _Now_ ,” Till growled. When he used my first name and in that tone of voice, I knew telling him no would be up there with playing Russian roulette with an AK-47.  I sighed, handed the phone over to Richard and dropped my head in my hands, shoving my fingers in my ears so I wouldn’t hear the oncoming argument. If there were two more stubborn, bull-headed people on the planet, I’d never met them. And oh boy, was I glad I hadn’t.

 “Till, damn it, I’m okay. Chris is here, I really don’t…Till, I mean it. Oh for fuck’s sake, do what you want!” Richard yelled. I carefully unplugged my ears just as my mobile went sailing across the room. Richard stomped across the room, muttering quite unkind words about our singer and slammed the bathroom door behind him. I gave him a couple of minutes, then got up and knocked gently on the door. “Reesh? Can I come in or are you going to throw something at me?”

 “Yeah, it’s okay,” Richard sighed. I went into the bathroom and found my lover staring into the mirror over the sink, prodding delicately at his black eye. Hissing, he stepped back from the sink and turned the shower on, saying, “I’d better clean up before Till gets here. If he sees me like this there won’t be anything left of Berlin when he blows sky high.”

 ::

 Even with Richard cleaned up and a bit of heavy duty concealer over his black eye to mute it a little, our singer hit the ceiling. He hadn’t been inside our apartment more than a minute when he carefully took Richard’s chin in his hands, looked him over with a gaze that went right to the bone and said, “I want names and I want them now.”

 “Get in line, Till,” I said from my perch on the arm of the living room sofa. Richard had insisted being the one who opened the door when Till arrived, saying that he might be mad enough to hit first and ask questions later if he didn’t see Richard the first thing. I’d argued and we were still arguing when we heard the doorbell’s gentle chime. I gave up at that point, waved my arm in the general direction of the door and said, “It’s your neck.”

 Till let go of Richard and stalked through the apartment and into our kitchen, the air fairly crackling with his tamped-down fury. We followed behind like ducklings after their mother, exchanging more than a few nervous glances and wondering if we were going to be missing some butcher knives when Till left. He was rummaging through the cabinet we kept our good alcohol in and came up with a bottle of cherry vodka someone had given us as a housewarming present. Without saying a word, I collected three shot glasses from the dishwasher and handed them to Till, who poured all three of them full. He knocked his shot back before I could touch the other two glasses, then refilled his glass and sat down at the kitchen table. Richard edged up onto the counter top near the sink while I commandeered the antique rocking chair we kept in the kitchen.

 “Richard, tell me what’s going on,” Till finally said, turning his empty glass around in his fingers.

 “It’s nothing…” 

“ _Do not tell me it’s nothing_!” Till yelled. He took a deep breath, huffed down his nose, and continued. “Either tell me or Chris will. All I got from Joe was that you’d flipped out on the set of Emigrate’s new video and Chris was taking you home. So, you can understand why I’m just a _wee_ bit concerned, right? Don’t I have the right to be concerned about one of my best friends when they freak the hell out in public and I’m not there to help?”

 Richard climbed down from the counter top and poured Till another shot of vodka, then topped his own glass up. I hadn’t touched mine; I’d put it on the tiny shelf that was wedged between the rocking chair and the fridge. I figured I’d need it, listening to Richard tell his story all over again. He pulled one of the chairs out from the table up so we could hold hands, fixed his gaze on the kitchen window over the sink, and began talking. His voice never wavered in tone; it was as if he was reciting the ingredients from a box of cereal. It was scary as hell but not half as scary watching Till’s face go from scarlet, to vivid scarlet, then a nasty, pale shade of white, his sea-glass, greeny blue eyes going hard and then to heartbreakingly sad. Richard finished talking and leaned against me. I put an arm around him and pulled him close, whispering that he was going to be all right and that he’d done a good job talking to Till. Sounds stupid, yes, but a blind man could have seen the tiny thread of sanity Richard was clinging to.  A loud noise, a misspoken word, and he’d either become catatonic again or worse, suicidal. I’d seen it happen a few times before we became a couple and it broke my heart that a man so strong, vibrant, and cocky could be broken so easily. I looked over at Till, who was sitting motionless in his chair, staring down at the floor and his knuckles turning white around the shot glass in his hands.

 “Don’t break that, Till, you’ve got enough scars on your hands as it is,” I said softly. He set the glass back down on the table with a movement so controlled it was almost violent, stood, and came over to Richard and me. He knelt, took Richard’s hands and said, “Sorry isn’t enough to say but it’s all I have. I don’t understand why you didn’t say a word to us but that’s finished. Richard, how the hell have you lived with this?”

 “Because I know I’m loved,” he said softly. “And therapy. Lots of therapy.”

 Till said nothing else, just rose to his feet, slowly, and gave Richard a long, careful hug. He started to step away when I caught his sleeve, saying, “Thank you, Till. For not going off your nut over this and doing something insanely dumb.”

 Till wrapped an arm around my shoulders and squeezed me till I thought I was going to wheeze and said, “It took some effort, I’ll tell you that. Now, what are we going to do about this?”

 “We?” Richard stammered. “Till, you don’t have to involve yourself in this! I mean, thank you and everything but...”

  _“Eine Richtung, Ein Gefühl, Aus Fleisch und Blut, Ein Kollektiv,”_ Till said, grabbing his chair from the table and pulling it over to us. “Am I right?”

 I looked at Richard, who had a small smile on his face and a sparkle beginning to glow in his pretty eyes. He peered up at me through his fringe and said, “You’re not going to argue with him, are you?”

 “Hell no,” I replied, leaning over to kiss my beloved on the nose. “Never argue with a man who knows how to set things on fire and won’t hesitate to do it, either.”


	4. Chapter 4

“He’s been on the phone with Jonas for an hour.” 

I looked up at Richard, who was curled up in one corner of our couch, wrapped in a heavy blanket and eyes foggy with exhaustion. I’d laid down with my head in his lap at his insistence, and was halfway asleep when his soft-voiced comment woke me up. “Are they yelling?” I asked.

 “Not yet,” Richard replied, carefully picking through my hair and stroking some of my curls from my face. “Of course, the day’s still young.”

 I yawned, feeling my jaw crack, and wincing at the noise. Richard pulled the quilt that we’d tossed along the back of the couch over me and I snuggled under it, wanting to stay curled up with my lover till the moon fell out of the sky. I was exhausted both mentally and physically and I was sure Richard was at the end of his endurance as well even with the nap we’d had earlier. I was dropping off to sleep again when I heard the door to our bedroom click open. Struggling to sit up, I saw Till coming out, a puzzled look on his face. He sat down in a chair across from the couch, rubbed his jaw, and said, “I’ve just had the most interesting conversation with Jonas.”

 “Huh?” I said, confused and half-asleep. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and tried to focus on Till, who was staring off into some place above our heads, eyes seeing something we didn’t.  “What in the world are you talking about?” Richard asked, shifting around in his seat so he could cuddle me into his side. 

“Jonas said that _you_ told him he was fired, Reesh,” Till began, eyes still distant and vague. “He said you sent him an e-mail telling him you’d found a better director and that he was really pissed off that you didn’t have the balls to call him and tell him that.” 

“What the...I didn’t do that!” Richard snapped, half-rising from the couch and remembering at the last second that I was half in his lap. He sat back down, saying, “I got an e-mail from the record company saying they’d fired Jonas and that there was a new director for our video. I spent an hour on the phone with three different people raising all kinds of hell and getting nowhere. When I tried to get in touch with Jonas and ask him what was going on, he hung up on me, then he blew off my phone calls and never answered my e-mails. Since we were going to be behind schedule if we didn’t go on with the video, I never thought to question who showed up to direct it. I’d thought about it but...this is all my fault.”

 “No, it’s not, Reesh,” Till said gently. “This guy had everyone fooled, from the record company on down. _He_ was the one who sent out the e-mails, the one who told Jonas he was fired, told the record company Jonas wasn’t going to do the video because you’d fired him, everything.”

 I didn’t have to look into Richard’s face to see the rage building; I could feel him trembling against me. He was breathing harshly, fingers digging into the blanket (but thankfully not into me). “I’m going to kill him,” he growled. “I’m going to tear that fucker into small pieces and feed him to...to something big, nasty and hungry.”

 “Oh, I’m not done yet, I’ve got a little bit more to tell you,” Till said. “While I was on the phone with Jonas, he did a little digging on Vadim...Stan...whatever-the-fuck his name really is. Yeah, the guy _is_ a video director but he’s never worked here, in London, anywhere except in the States. And you’ll never guess what kind of videos he directs.”

 “Please do not tell me he does hard-core porn,” I begged Till.  “You say that and I’m going to go quietly insane in the corner.”

 “Nope, he does safety videos for the construction industry,” Till replied. He snorted, shook his head, and continued, “If this whole mess wasn’t so fucked up beyond recognition, it would be funny.”

 Richard whimpered quietly, burying his head against my shoulder. He started to giggle, the sound harsh and edged with hysteria. “You’re right, Till, if it wasn’t so fucked up it would be funny.” I pulled my arm from under my blanket and put it around Richard, murmuring, “It’s okay baby, we’re gonna fix this. Just hang in there a little longer.” He gulped, nodded, and curled into my arm and closed his eyes. Within a few moments, he was out like a light; Till waited until we were sure he was completely asleep before he said, “Jonas wants Richard to call him as soon as he can to apologize. And someone from the record company is going to get an ass-kicking come Monday from Jonas as well.” 

“Thank you Till, for doing all of this for Reesh, for...” I began, only to have Till lean over and press his hand against my mouth to hush me. “I know, Doomie, you don’t have to say anything else. I’ve done what I can; now there’s something you have to do.” When I looked at him, desperate for help, he said, “You tell that man in your arms every single day that what happened is not his fault in any way, shape or form. You tell him every single day that you love him more than anything, even yourself, and tell him again over and over again if he doesn’t believe you until he does.”

 Blinking back tears, I could only nod my head at one of my oldest, best friend’s advice. Till stood up, ruffled my hair, then tucked Richard’s blanket under his chin. “I’ll get going. If you need anything, I’ll be here in a heartbeat, okay?”

 Once Till was gone, I shook Richard awake and convinced him to get up and come to bed, saying, “The bed’s softer than my bony shoulder, baby.”

 “When is this all going to be over?” he whimpered, wrapping his arms around me and burying his face in my chest. “What the hell did I do to deserve this?”

 I shook Richard gently, and then lifted his head up to look him in the eye. “You did not a single thing to deserve this, sweetheart. _Nothing_. And I will do everything I possibly can to set things right again. All you need to do is believe that I love you more than anything on this Earth and that none of this is your fault. Can you do that for me?”

 Richard sniffled and nodded but didn’t move from his spot on the couch. I held him awhile longer, my brain buzzing as I thought over what I might be able to do, discarding some ideas right off the bat. Richard fell asleep again as I sat there, lost in thought, and soon I was following him into dreamland, images of me chasing Stan/Vadim down and cutting him into pieces with a dull butcher knife making me smile nastily. I was going to make the bastard pay for what he did to my beloved, and I was going to have a wonderfully fun time doing it.

 


	5. Chapter 5

The feeling of warm, soft lips brushing over mine woke me up in the middle of the night. I came to slowly, confused at first as to where I was. Blinking my eyes open, I realized Richard and I had fallen asleep on the couch, never making it to bed. We’d managed to wiggle around until I was lying half on, half off his lap, his head pressed against my chest and my fingers tangled in his hair. I leaned into the kiss, feeling the first sparks of lust waking in my nerves. Richard made a soft, purring sound and pulled away, a mischievous smile curving his lips and dark eyes gleaming in the dim light coming from the nightlights in the hallway. 

“You feeling better?” I whispered, capturing his plush, soft lips for another long, heated kiss. He murmured against my mouth, the words unintelligible but I got the meaning. He was feeling better, _much_ better, and with that came the firestorm of lust, love and hunger that we shared. I’d never met anyone in my life who enjoyed all the facets of sex, from simple kissing and making out to the kind of sex that left you exhausted for days, the neighbors calling the police either to complain about the noise or in fear that someone was being chopped up with an axe, and sometimes broken bed frames. I wasn’t _quite_ that wild (I’d never broken any bed frames---yet) but I could keep up with Richard easily. He was the best lover I’d ever had, male or female. Thankfully before we discovered how much we lusted after one another, we’d been the best of friends, sharing our lives, our difficulties and simple moments that cemented our friendship.

 We’d not always been friends; when I first joined Rammstein, I’d been kind of put off by Richard's  arrogance; it took a couple of months before we'd say more than “Hi” to one another. Not until he’d told me about his flight to freedom and later being arrested by the Stasi by being in the wrong place at the wrong time did I finally see the real Richard Kruspe. After that we’d been so close, getting into trouble, making music, chasing women, and enjoying our lives.

 Things weren’t always sunshine and happiness; anyone who knew the band had stories aplenty of our horrible arguements that nearly came to blows (and sometimes I wished they had if only to diffuse the bad feelings faster), days when nobody was sure there was going to _be_ a Rammstein left to recover from the arguments, days where we’d sequester ourselves in the studio and come out 24 hours later with something brilliant, then fall over and sleep for three days. Rammstein is a madhouse that will either kill you or drive you just a little bit crazy if you’re not already there.

 It was sometime during the “Made In Germany” tour that I realized I was beginning to develop feelings toward Richard that I’d thought were once drunken flights of fancy. We’d made out onstage a few times, partially as a joke, and off stage to shock people (and get girls) but the warm, sparkling feeling in my stomach wouldn’t go away afterwards. I thought it was my imagination.

 I’d decided to resurrect “Frau Schneider” for the tour, but instead of the full kit of costume, makeup, and  wig from the “Mein Teil” video, I found a bleached out, frazzled, platinum blonde wig that looked like the curls had been brushed with an eggbeater and a horrible, trashy, sleeveless dress that had a pattern on it that rivaled any of Richard’s infamous, ugly shirts. Wearing those with smeared, scarlet lipstick and a riding whip in hand, I looked like an evil hooker from Hell. Add to that having Paul, Richard, Ollie and Flake on a four-way leash, crawling across the elevated bridge that led from the “A” stage to the tiny “B” stage that was set up in the middle of the arena, suffering whatever abuse “the Frau” delt out on a nightly basis and we were in business. Richard waited for us on the “B” stage, playing the usual intro to “Bück Dich,” so he wasn’t subjected to the “Frau’s” mock rage. He'd grin at me or nod, totally lost in what he was doing and ignore me. While I brushed it off, a tiny part of me was sad that he didn't seem to notice the looks I gave him sometimes.

 Halfway through the tour, the little shit changed the game.  Sometimes he would do something to tease me, like play a few bars of the song after I’d told him to stop, made faces at me and once, threw the black fabric that covered my drum kit over my head as I was standing over a kneeling Till, waiting to shove his microphone in his mouth as I did every night. He even managed one night to pinch my ass as I walked by and I smacked his ass, hard, with the crop. His eyes lit up and he smirked at me, dropping me a wink as he turned his back to me. The hot rush of lust that made my head buzz lasted through the entire show and sent me running for the bathroom at the end of the show to have the fastest, most violent wank I’d ever had in my life, and gave me erotic dreams for days.

 We were three days away from the end of the tour and all of us itching to finish and head home for a well-deserved, _long_ vacation. I’d been doing my usual warmup and hadn’t noticed Richard coming up beside me. A flicker of red out of the corner of my eye startled me into dropping my sticks and spinning around on my stool, yelling, “Richard! You scared the shit out of me!”

 He sat down on the monitor at my right, tucking his hands into the pockets of the bright red hoodie he had on. “Sorry about that. You were lost in what you were doing; I didn’t think you’d notice me till you quit. Do you have a few moments to talk, or am I interrupting?”

 Pulling my sweat-soaked headband off and plucking a towel from its place near my left foot, I wiped my face off and shook my hair out, making Richard squeak and scoot away with a “Don’t shake your icky drummer sweat off on me!”

 “Oh for fuck’s sake, Richard, you’ll wash. Not like you’ll dissolve in water. Now, what was it you wanted to talk about? I’m as done as I’m going to be here.”

 “You know I’m bisexual, right?” Richard asked, staring at my shoes. I started twirling my sticks around in my hands, wondering where in the world this was going. “Of course, I do. How long have we known each other?” 

“Have you ever had a crush on a guy?” he continued as if he hadn’t heard me, still staring at my feet. “Or on someone you know you couldn’t have?”

 I didn’t need telepathy to know what Richard was getting at, and I was glad that he wasn’t going at this situation like he normally did---full steam ahead and damn the torpedoes. Placing my sticks back into their storage bag, I leaned over, took his hands, and said, “You’re not the only who’s had a crush on a guy, on someone they thought they coudn’t have.” 

Richard sat up like he’d been shocked with a cattle prod, his gorgeous blue eyes round and wide with shock. “Schneider…Christoph…I thought you were…well, straight, with the occasional flirting with guys. Kind of. Maybe.” 

I bit back a laugh at the expression on his face and reached over, carefully, to push a lock of his black hair out of his eyes. “I only have sex with someone I love. You’ll notice I’ve been as celibate as a monk the past several months. And a couple of blowjobs from groupies don’t count in my book. I’ve never had actual sex with a guy, but I’ve thought about it quite often.”

Richard blinked, blinked again, and stared at me a moment before answering, “You…you like me like… _that?_ Really?”

 Rather than try to explain anything and make his poor, overheated brain explode, I pulled my stool closer to him, leaned down, and tugging on the front of his hoodie, pulled Richard to me and pressed a slow, gentle kiss to his lips. He started when our lips touched, but a second later he was reaching up to pull me closer and deepen the kiss. I was the first to break the kiss, partially because I was running out of air and I could hear Till and Paul yelling at each other somewhere outside. We were both blushing and uncomfortable when they arrived in the arena but thankfully neither Paul nor Till noticed, they were too caught up in discussing something that I didn’t even try to decipher. Instead, I murmured to Richard, “It's about damn time you noticed. We’ll continue this discussion tonight after the show. You okay with that?”

 It took Richard a few seconds to drag his brain back from whatever gutter it had wandered off into and say, “Uh…ah…yeah, sure. Good thing you’re just across the hall from me. My room?”

 “Sure. And I’ll make sure to take a shower before I show up so I don’t get my ‘icky drummer sweat’ all over you,” I teased, poking Richard in the shoulder as I passed him, looking back to see him smiling at me and waving his finger in admonishment. I put a bit of a sway and strut into my walk, knowing he was still watching and wanting to torment him just a _tiny_ bit. He told me later it had taken all the self-control he had, and then some, not to run after me and tackle me to the floor in front of God and everyone. 

That night when we were getting ready for the second part of the show, I saw Paul and Richard off in a corner, muttering quietly, hands flailing about as they talked. I figured it was guitar player stuff, so I dug my “Frau” stuff out of its box and shoved the wig on, making sure to tousle it up till it looked like it had been dragged from my head and used for a dust mop. I shrugged the dress on over my stage clothes, slapped on the lipstick and smeared it with the back of my hand, leaving a crimson streak down my knuckles and chin. Till had been in a grumpy mood all day and nothing anyone had done was able to shake him out of it. 

I was turning to grab a last quick drink of water when Richard came over to me, holding an eyeliner pencil in his fingers. “C’m here,” he said, gesturing at me. I stopped in front of him, wondering what he was going to do, when he reached over and said, “A lady never goes out without her eyeliner done properly, you know.” I rolled my eyes upward and let Richard smudge around them a heavy layer of black eyeliner. When he said, “Done!” I looked over into a nearby mirror and almost peed myself laughing at the dark haze around my eyes, the sloppy lipstick, the hurricane mess of dirty blonde hair and the colored dress hanging haphazardly from my shoulders. “I look like Alice Cooper’s sister!” I crowed, baring my teeth in a feral, mad smile at everyone.

 “No, you’d scare Alice Cooper into a heart attack,” Paul said, slapping me on the shoulder as he went by. I looked at Richard, who was hiding his giggles behind a hand, and at Ollie, who wasn’t trying a bit to hide his laughter. As he walked by me he said, “I hope you realize it’s going to kill me trying not to laugh at you out there.”

 I grabbed my riding crop from its spot in my road trunk and popped Ollie on the behind, making him jump. “Shush. Twenty bucks says I can make Till laugh in the middle of ‘Bück Dich’.”

 “Forty says he won’t make it past the door,” Ollie replied. We shook on it and headed over to the doorway that lead back up to the stage, where Till, Flake and Paul were waiting for Ollie to join them so they could be snapped into the leads. I kept sort of in the dark near Richard’s shoulder till he sneaked out with an escort to the “B” stage, and when the tech who’d been in charge of the leads handed me the end, I hopped into the light, flinging my hands wide and said in the most feminine voice I could muster, “Well boys, it’s _showtime_!”

 Till stood frozen in place for a full minute, eyes widening as he took in my appearance. He blinked twice, again, then turned around and began laughing so hard I thought he was going to pass out from lack of air. He leaned against Ollie, who was smirking at me, and howled with laughter. Paul was snickering at Till and Ollie; all Flake could say was “Dear God, Schneider, you look like a mass-murdering, cannibal housewife from Hell.”

 We made it to the “B” stage with all of us doing our level best not to crack up at each other. By the time we’d made it across the bridge we’d managed to calm down, but I could _not_ look anyone in the eye the rest of the evening for fear we’d start laughing again. Once the show was over, all bets were off. We sat in the green room for an hour, teasing Till for the look on his face, me getting a good deal of harassment from everyone in general and from Richard…well. All I got from him was a sly glance and a crooked, evil smile.  I returned his smile, mouthing, “Later?”

 Oh, that smile…that smile could turn an angel to sinning for all eternity. I hurried through my shower and getting dressed; by the time I was done Richard was lounging on one of the sofas in the green room, eyes closed and looking every inch a human version of a wild cat. Even though he was in ratty jeans, trainers and a t-shirt that might have once been orange but was now faded to a soft sort-of salmon color, he still gave off an air of controlled danger, smoldering lust, and mischief. He opened his eyes when he heard me come up to him and stretched, shirt riding up to show off a luscious expanse of his lightly-tanned, smooth stomach. “Do you want to grab dinner somewhere?” he said through a huge yawn.

 “Nah, I’m okay. You?”

 “Same here. Maybe later. You ready to head back to the hotel?” Richard asked, shrugging into his battered leather jacket. I pulled the hood up on my sweatshirt and followed him to the minibus that would take us back to the hotel. Ollie and Flake had headed back earlier, both pleading exhaustion, so it was just myself and Richard on the trip over. We didn’t talk much during the twenty-minute drive back, just the occasional short comment about the show and Richard’s snort-laugh at my retelling of the bet Ollie and I had. Once we were in the hotel’s elevator, I looked over at Richard and said softly, “We don’t have to talk about this tonight. If you’re tired, I understand.”

 “Chickening out, Christoph?” Richard purred, stepping closer, crowding me into a corner. He smelled so wonderful, my head started to spin a little at the scents coming from his skin, his clothes, and the sheer strength of his presence. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t speak. All I could do was stare at the man who I’d been friends with for so long and just…. _stare._

 “No. I’m not chickening out,” I mumbled, finally able to speak. Richard smiled at me, ran a finger down my cheek and said, “You’re a lot prettier without that awful wig slapped on your head.”

 “I’m glad. I never know what I’m going to look like every night because I shove that thing into the deepest corner of my road case. Whatever possessed me to pick out a blonde wig, I’ll never know,” I replied, hoping Richard couldn’t hear how hard my heart was pounding. The chime of the bell that notified us we’d reached our floor saved me from having to think of something else to say, and I all but ran out of the elevator, fumbling for my key card as I went. I stumbled into my room, shedding my jacket and sneakers, hoping that Richard hadn’t taken my flight out of the elevator as an insult.

I didn’t have to worry about that, a quiet cough from the doorway pulled my attention away from my shaking hands to see Richard lounging against the doorframe, one black, elegant eyebrow raised at me. “Would you rather we have this talk you’re wanting to have in here? Because you look like you’d rather throw yourself out of the window than leave your room,” he said softly.

 Choking back a sigh of relief, I said, “Thanks. I appreciate it. Come on in, then, and get comfortable.” I busied myself getting us both a couple of bottles of water out of the fridge, then I set a full bottle of Jägermeister on the low table next to the big, bay window of the main room. Richard chucked his jacket and boots near my outerwear and snagged one of the big, fluffy armchairs that stood near the window. I took the other, cracked the lid of both bottles of water and handed him one, saying, “So. Where were we?”

 “Before you popped out of the elevator like you’d been shot out of a cannon, or earlier?” Richard teased, saluting me with his water before taking a drink. I managed a couple swallows of my own before I said, “Don’t be difficult. You know what I’m talking about, Kruspe.”

 Richard propped his feet up on the table near the Jägermeister and considered me for a moment. “We were talking about me having a crush on you, and you dropping the bomb of the century on me that you had the same kind of feelings for me. And then you kissed me. How the fuck have I known you this long and not noticed any of this?”

 “For one, you’ve never shown any interest in me,” I said, propping my feet up as well and toying with the lid from the water bottle. “Secondly, you’ve been playing the hetero side of the field for so long I figured you were settled in what you did or didn’t do, sexually. And finally, I’m not getting any younger. I’m tired of going from relationship to relationship, knowing there’s something missing but never being able to figure out what it is, or who might have that missing ‘something’ I’m looking for. I want to settle down, I want to have someone steady in my life.”

 “When did you figure out you wanted me?” Richard said softly, every trace of sarcasm gone from his voice. He looked vulnerable and sort of lost, wedged into the chair, black hair blending into its black fabric, his dark blue eyes distant and kind of sad. “I’m not an easy person to be in a relationship with, much less work with.”

 “That you aren’t,” I said, giving up on the water and opening the Jägermeister. I took a big swig out of the bottle and handed it to Richard, who declined it with a wave of his fingers. “I’m no saint myself. I’m stubborn, I can be a snobby bitch and you know how I am when we’re working on something. But Reesh, that doesn’t matter. You’re one of my best friends. You can be a lovely, sweet, and gentle person when you’re not playing up for the public. You’re intelligent, you have a great sense of humor and damn, boy, if you haven’t noticed how I’ve been staring at your ass for the past year, you’re blind.”

 Richard threw his head back and laughed, reaching for the Jägermeister and knocking back a shot of his own. “So that’s why when I walk past you, there’s this place on my ass that gets hot.”

 I snorted and finished my water before I said, “And you thought all this time it was the pyro burning a hole in your pants.”

 “Something like that, yeah.”

 “Now it’s your turn. Why me, Richard? Why me, when there’s so many other people out there?”  I asked, taking control of the bottle again. Richard waved off my gesture for the bottle and sat, lost in thought for about a minute before saying, “You’re gorgeous. You always have been. You have the brightest, most generous, and loving heart. You tolerate shit I’d lose my mind over. You’re patient, you’re kind and one of the best friends I’ve ever had. And for a drummer, you’re pretty smart, too!”

 I made a sort-of bow in Richard’s direction at that comment, saying, “Gee, I’m glad someone noticed I can count past four without help!”

 “Is that without taking your shoes and socks off?” Richard teased, a wicked light sparkling in his eyes.

 “You little shit!” I yelled, launching myself out of the chair and in Richard’s direction. He met me halfway, springing out of his seat, grabbing my arms and swinging me past him. I managed to get a grip on the waistband of his jeans and he came along with me, trying to stop his momentum, and giving up with a laugh as we made a very ungraceful landing on my bed. I knew Richard’s weak spot was being tickled along his ribs and under his arms, and I took the second between our landing and Richard’s trying to grab my wrists to shove my fingers into his ribs. He went down like a falling tree, squealing with helpless laugher; I rolled him to his back, sat on his hips, pinning him down to the bed. He wiggled beneath me, trying to figure out a way to get his hands free of mine but I held on for dear life. I wasn’t about to let him go; I knew if I did he’d return my tickling by grabbing my feet and tickling them. If there was anything on this Earth that would stop me cold it was having my feet tickled. It always reduced me to helpless giggles that took me forever to get over.

 Between one second of us laughing at each other and Richard threatening to tickle my feet until I peed myself, the tiny spark of desire we’d felt back at the arena flared to a bonfire. I gasped as Richard arched his hips under me, suddenly twisting his hands around to free them from my grip. He grabbed my shoulders and before I could react, we were kissing like we were doing it for the last time. I whimpered and let Richard roll me onto my back, never breaking the kiss. I pulled him as close as he could physically get to me, grinding my hips up against his, feeling how hard he was inside his jeans.

 “Schneider...Christoph...do you want this?” Richard said in a ragged gasp when we stopped kissing long enough to breathe. “Because if you don’t, we’d better stop now before we do something we’ll regret.”

 “I want you more than anything,” I sighed into his lips, reaching up to run my fingers through his spiky hair. “Do you want _me_?”

 Richard’s answer was a long, sweet kiss that left me dizzy. There wasn’t going to be time tonight for teasing foreplay or anything of the sort; we tore our clothes off, sending buttons flying to crack against the walls and at one point I accidentally poked Richard in the stomach with an elbow. He wheezed and said, “Are you going to kill me before we fuck or after?”

 “Wait and see,” I purred, pushing him back onto the bed and pinning him there once again. Our hands wandered, touched, caressed and pinched; before long I was stretched out under Richard’s sleek, gorgeous body, trembling as he pressed one heavily lubricated finger into my body.

 “I’ll be careful and I’ll go slow,” he whispered, leaning down to kiss me slow and deep as he slid his finger deeper and deeper into me. There was a long, stinging burn, the feeling of being maddingly pushed open and apart, then slowly, gradually, the feelings faded to a starburst of heat that left me gasping. I wasn’t sure when Richard finally entered me but when I did, I almost screamed from the combined icy pain and blinding pleasure that flattened me. I was helpless underneath him, lost to the pleasure, the need, and the built-up months of desire I’d felt for him. I’d hoped like mad for so long that Richard wanted me as much as I wanted him and now here were at last. We clung to one another, burying our screams of need in each other’s shoulders and hands, my fingernails leaving long, red tracks down Richard’s back as he bit bruises into my chest. I was so close to orgasm I couldn’t speak; Richard seemed to know what I needed and took my member into his warm hands and brought me up to my peak before I could catch my breath. I went over the top and fell, Richard’s own release right behind me. Lost in lust, joy, and the best orgasm I’d had in a long time, I lost consciousness for a few seconds, only coming around when I felt Richard slide out of me and plop down onto the bed.

 “Oh. Dear. God,” Richard breathed finally, fumbling around till he found my hand and clutched it in his own. He was trembling slightly from his release, as was I; we lay in silence for so long I thought he’d finally gone to sleep.

 “Reesh, you awake?” I said, giving our joined hands a gentle shake.

 “No, I’m dead,” he replied in a snorting laugh. “I’ve died and gone to heaven, I think.”

 I rolled over and laid my head on Richard’s sweat-damp chest and sighed, “Don’t die before I do, okay?”

 “Corny, sweetheart, really corny.”

 “Yes, but you loved it.”

 “True.”

 


	6. Chapter 6

So now I lay with my beloved, watching his eyes deepen with need as we stared at each other in the dim light. We’d gone through so much since that fateful, wonderful night, and there was a time or two that I was sure our relationship was going to fall apart. We’d broken up once for a grand total of four days which would have been longer if Flake and Ollie hadn’t sat us down in Flake’s kitchen and stood over us with cast iron skillets in their hands, threatening to murder us both if we didn’t settle our differences at once. Neither us remembered any more what the problem had been, but the memory of our friends wielding skillets over our heads, grim as death, was something neither of us would forget. We’d had problems, but I never thought Richard and I would go through this kind of hell, not in a million years. 

“Take me away from this,” Richard sighed against my lips. “Take me somewhere I don’t have to think about anything other than you buried inside me, the feel of your hands on my skin, hear you screaming my name when you come.”

 I unwrapped us from our tangle of blankets and stood, holding my hand out for Richard. He stood up in one long, graceful move, and began towing me towards our bedroom. Shedding our clothes didn’t take long and once we were down to bare skin, I urged Richard up onto the bed. We fell back to kissing, hands roaming over warming flesh, fingers tangling in hair, in each other, our cocks rubbing together and making us both whimper with need. I didn’t need Richard to tell me what he wanted; I slid down his body, kissing every inch of skin that I could touch as I went, parting his legs so I could settle between them. He trembled under my touch, a wheezing gasp heralding the moment I ran my tongue up his cock, from the base to the tip.

 “Oh my God, Christoph, oh, oh please, suck me off...”

 So, I went to it, nibbling, licking, suckling, and teasing my beloved’s cock, using all the tricks I knew to bring him up to the edge, and then backing off to hear him snarl at me. “Patience, patience,” I chided.

 “Fuck patience, I need you to...oh _shit_ , Chris, oh...” 

I smiled to myself as I took his cock down my throat and swallowed around it several times, hearing Richard’s voice crack and squeal prettily. He thrashed under me, sometimes grabbing my shoulders so hard I knew he’d leave bruises, sometimes gripping the sheets till his knuckles turned white. I could tell he was very, very close to his end from his gasps and that he was quickly losing his ability to speak; I pulled away and whispered, “Do you want me inside you or do you want inside me?”

 “Baby, I don’t care, just finish me,” Richard whimpered, running shaking fingers through my hair. 

 And I did. One long, slow lick up the shaft, one quick breath of air over the tip and Richard came, a cry of delight frozen in his throat. I caught most of his release in my hand but some smeared over my lips and splattered down my arm. Rather than wipe it away, I caught Richard’s streaming eyes and lewdly licked away the pearly fluid that was shining against my hand. He closed his eyes with a soft whimper that went right to my cock. I didn’t take more than a moment to find the lube we kept in our bedside table, coat myself with the cool, slippery liquid and douse my fingers in a puddle of it so I could prepare my sweetheart for the fuck of his life. I took my time widening him, one finger at a time, kissing his belly, his upper thighs and close to, but not touching his cock, feeling him shudder from the aftereffects of his first orgasm and the building fury of a second one. I sighed happily, the fact that I could bring Richard to a second release so close to the first a real boost to my ego.

 “Let me inside you,” I whispered, pulling my fingers free of Richard’s body and sliding up his shaking form so I could kiss him. “Let me take you away from everything for a little while.”

 Richard didn’t reply, just spread his gorgeous legs wider for me. I knelt between them, took myself in hand, and let myself fall inside him, inch by inch, until we were joined together completely. I’d lost all ability to speak the second I was inside his hot, tight body; all I could do now was pant and whimper Each stroke when I was almost outside his body was a moment of agony, instinct goading me to thrust harder, faster, and deeper, to claim this handsome man that lay below me, sobbing my name, and clenching my hips with sweaty hands.

 “ _Tiefer_...Christoph... _schwerer._..please, please, Chris...”

 “I don’t want to hurt you!”

 “You won’t, I need it...just _fuck me!_ ” Richard screamed, grabbing his now-hard cock and jerking himself so roughly I was afraid he’d hurt something. Slinging my arms around his neck, I pulled him up against me as I went up on my knees, trapping him in my lap, his hands flailing around until he realized he needed to hold on to me, not his cock, or he’d fall over and I’d fall out of him. I wasn’t able to thrust as hard as I would have otherwise, but it would be more than enough for both of us to be satisfied. Richard buried his head against my neck and sobbed, helpless, as I took him as hard and rough as I was able. I clung to him, my eyes falling shut as the storm inside me grew into a hurricane of desire that caught me up and drowned me in sensation. Richard writhed in my lap, his cock stimulated fiercely by the friction of our bodies and giving him his second orgasm of the night, albeit a dry one.

 We slid down onto the bed, with me still buried deep inside and Richard sprawled on the sheets beneath me. I could only stay up on my hands for so long before my arms began to tremble, telling me I only had a few seconds before they gave out and dumped me onto Richard’s. I slid out of him, gently, and collapsed onto the bed, utterly spent. I rolled over and snuggled up to Richard, one arm around his waist and the other tucked under my pillow. He made a soft little grunting noise and wiggled closer to me, eyes closed and obviously sleepy.

 “I love you so very much,” he murmured. “You’ve saved me from myself so many times, you love me even if I’m a bitch to you and...”

 He was asleep.

 “Poor baby. You’ve gone through so much, haven’t you?” I sighed, fumbling around to find a blanket to cover us up with. Soon, too, I was asleep as well, and thankfully the only dreams I could remember were boring, unimaginative ones. If I had any that were erotic or nightmare-filled, I didn’t remember them.

 A whisper of cool air over my bare shoulder tugged me out of my dreams early the next morning. I opened my eyes and saw Richard leaning over me, a sleepy, gentle smile on his face. Rolling over, I pulled him down against me and said, “You’re up early.”

 “I woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep, so I made coffee and threw some cinnamon rolls in the oven to bake. Do you want to come into the kitchen or do you want breakfast in bed?”

 “If you’ll stay naked, I vote for breakfast in bed,” I sighed, stretching and wiggling about, both to wake up and to see how turned on I could get Richard to be without saying a word. He raised an elegant eyebrow and purred, “I could eat you up right now. You look absolutely edible lying there, all sprawled out and rumpled. And naked. Especially the naked part.”

 “Well, why don’t you?” I asked, half-closing my eyes and smiling like the cat that got the canary and a bowl of milk.

 “Give me a second to get the cinnamon rolls out of the oven and I’ll do just that,” Richard replied, leaning over to give me a long, heated kiss. As he walked away, I wolf-whistled at the sight of his bare behind and he stopped in the bedroom doorway, turned, and winked. With a sigh, I snuggled down into the covers and closed my eyes, anticipation simmering in my veins. The scent of bittersweet coffee and the warm, spicy scent of cinnamon heralded Richard’s return; I sat up to take my mug from his hands and breathe in the mingled scents of rich coffee and the hint of vanilla sugar that took the merest edge from the coffee’s bitterness. The first sip was nirvana, the second was paradise, and the cinnamon roll I snitched from the plate that Richard had put on the bed between us made me think I’d died and gone to heaven.

 “ _Is gut?_ ” Richard asked, leaning over to lick a smear of icing that had deposited itself on my cheek. I grinned over at him, taking a fingerful of the icing from the top of my cinnamon roll and dabbing it on his chin. He snorted and started to wipe the icing away but I was quicker and licked away the sweetness before he could even begin to move.

 “Eww. Icky drummer germs!”

 “Shut up. You weren’t objecting to me slobbering my “icky drummer germs” all over certain parts of your anatomy earlier,” I teased. Richard snickered, picking up his own cinnamon roll and taking a big bite out of it. He drank half of his coffee down, set the mug back on the bedside table and said, “So. Where were we?”

 I put my now-empty mug down on the table at my side of the bed, slowly licking the last of the icing and cinnamon goop from my fingers. “You said something about me looking good enough to eat, I believe.”

 Richard laughed low in his throat as he crept across the bed towards me, predatory smile on his face and mischief written in every line of his body. I leaned back into the pillows, Richard following my every move until he had me flattened into the mattress. I writhed under his rough, talented fingers, nimble tongue, and lips, losing my mind inch by inch as I surrendered everything I was to him. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak unless I was told to do so and I didn’t care one bit. I would have gladly thrown myself in front of a truck if Richard had told me to do so at that moment.

 Trapped beneath Richard’s strong, muscled body, pinned with hands, legs, and cock, I gave up every iota of control to him, begged him with a voice that went hoarse to shrieking in a breath to fuck me till I died, take me, and use me for anything he wanted. He bit my neck hard enough to bring up a bruise, hissing at me to lie still and take what he was giving me. I couldn’t _not_ move, which made the game even more exciting because the more I wriggled, the harder Richard took me, the more he bit me, the more he told me over and over how tight I was, how pretty I looked spread out underneath him, how much he loved me and more.

 “Such a pretty little pet, Christoph. You’re such a good boy, do you want to come? If you’ll be a good pet, a pretty pet, I’ll let you come first,” Richard growled, biting the other side of my neck until I could feel blood begin to slip down my skin. I screamed so loud I made the walls ring; I dug my fingers into his back until I knew there would be reddened hot spots on his skin quite soon.

 “I take it that’s a yes? Are you sure, sweetheart? Because I can be _so_ mean to you and leave you till later.”

 “You do that you bloody bastard and I’ll strangle you,” I snapped. “Please Reesh, I’ve been very good, please let me come first.”

 Richard stopped moving and stared down at me, challenge and amusement shining in his eyes. “What’s the magic word, my dear?”

 I could have strangled him happily at that point; I glared up at him and said in a hiss, “ _Now_ , goddamn it!”

 “Such language. But I promised I’d let you come first,” he said, wrapping his fingers around my length and slowly stroking me up to my breaking point. He kept me on edge for I don’t know how long, alternating how short or long, tight or loose his strokes were with thrusting inside me in the same manner. By the time I was seeing stars and losing touch with reality, Richard was close to his own end and within a moment, I came, harder than I had in a long time and took him with me. It took us a long time to separate and even longer to do more than lie on the sweaty, mussed sheets and relearn how to breathe, to speak, to move. Afterwards, we took a long, hot shower together, playing like little kids in the soap bubbles and water. I was feeling light-headed and happy; my lover was obviously feeling the same as we dried off and got dressed in old t-shirts and boxers that had seen better days. Richard’s smile and sparkling eyes outshone the sun that was beginning to peek over the rooftops; after the events of the past day I was so happy to see that I’d done something to push away his fear and pain.

 We finally cuddled up in bed with refills of coffee and another cinnamon roll each, half of the morning paper piled carelessly at the foot of the bed. I was working my way through the crossword puzzle while Richard yawned his way through the sports scores and comics. I felt his eyes on me; I looked over to see him smiling shyly at me.

 “What is it?” I asked, setting the paper and my pencil aside.

 “This. Us. It’s so...homey. Domestic. I like it and I don’t ever want it to end,” Richard whispered, gesturing about the room and at us with a hand that was shaking the tiniest bit.

 I could tell what had happened the previous day was coming back to bother him and sighed internally, wishing our happy moment could last just a bit longer. I slid my arm over his shoulders and pulled him under my arm, saying, “As long as I’m alive, this is how we’ll be. Happy, domestic, homey. Nothing is going to stop me from being with you. And I mean that, Richard. _Nothing_.”

 Richard didn’t speak; he kissed my shoulder and settled down against my side with a deep sigh. “I’m so scared, Christoph. I wish I could remember if...what’s his name was at that party the night I was...well. And he wasn’t, how does he know what happened, that someone said ‘run little bunny, run’ to me right before the...you know...began?”

 “You’re not going to face this alone. I won’t let it happen. We’ll figure out what that prick’s game is and when it’s all said and done, I’ll make him wish he’d never been born. Even if you weren’t my lover, I’d still want a piece of his hide because you’re my friend first,” I murmured. “Till will have to get in line for his pound of flesh, I get first dibs.”

 Richard sighed deeply and wrapped an arm around my waist. I stroked his back, gently kneading his tight back muscles until he went limp under my fingers and off to sleep. I waited several moments to make sure he was completely asleep before grabbing my mobile from its charger and bringing up the app I used to keep notes with. Awkwardly typing with my thumb and one finger as I still had one arm around Richard, I made out a list of ideas and questions I’d been formulating since I’d brought him home. By the time I was done, I was shaking with suppressed anger and more than a little fear that I’d written down a list that was so full of cruelty and bitter wrath, and was more than prepared to go after the person or people that had nearly destroyed the man I loved without blinking an eye. Like I said, I have a temper and now that I’m older I know how to keep it under control but this wasn’t the time to play nice.

 I saved the document and tossed my mobile to the foot of the bed, pulling the blankets over myself and Richard and stared out the bedroom window, turning my thoughts over and over in my head and never once feeling as if I was heading straight into a situation that would’ve been better handled by the police and a boxful of very powerful lawyers. I’d meant what I said, I wanted my piece of this bastard and I’d get it come hell or high water.

 And I am very good at getting what I want.

  _Very_ good.


	7. Chapter 7

I made Richard stay in bed most of the day, only allowing him up to use the bathroom. I brought him lunch in bed, sneaking one of the sleeping pills the medic from the video shoot the previous day had given me into his coffee and covering the bitter taste up with a tiny bit of vanilla extract splashed into the liquid at the last second. I must have done a good job at disguising the nasty taste because Richard didn’t say anything when he finished his coffee and set the mug back onto the bedside table. I watched him like a hawk; within a half hour he was blinking sleepily at me and yawning.

“Think I’m gonna go back to sleep, sweetheart,” he slurred, nestling down into the blankets. I tucked him in with a kiss to the cheek, and the minute I knew he was out cold, stole out of the bedroom and into the little studio we’d put in right after we’d bought our apartment. I got comfortable on the big sofa that dominated the room, pulled my laptop out of its spot on the bookshelf behind the sofa, and started working my way through what I’d jotted down on my mobile earlier in the morning. I came to some dead ends early on and would have gotten discouraged, but the memory of the blank, lifeless look in Richard's eyes spurred me onward.

It was just this side of evening when I wrapped up my work and shut my laptop down. I had a headache, was so stiff from sitting still in one spot for so long I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stand up again properly, and my stomach roiling with fury to the point where I was nauseated. I put my laptop back in its place and dropped my head into my hands with a bitten off moan of pain. I’d know if my plans had worked out in a day or less and I prayed to a Being I wasn’t sure I believed in to make them work out. Too sore and sick to leave the studio, I curled up on the sofa, pulling a quilt from the back of it to snuggle under. I never really fell asleep, I drifted in a weird state of mine where I was balanced delicately between being wide awake and completely, out-of-it asleep. Occasional spikes of pain and queasiness kept me aware of where I was and what was going on, but I had no inclination to act on anything.

A gentle knock on the door roused me somewhat; Richard peered around the door and said, “What are you doing in here, Chris? Was I snoring or kicking in my sleep?”

“No, I came in here to mess around on my laptop for a bit. I've had a headache all day and I figured I’d hide out in here till it let up,” I said, holding the quilt up as an invitation for Richard to join me on the sofa. He slid in next to me before I could get a chill, arranging his body so I was the “big spoon” in our embrace. Any other time the sensation of his behind pressed against my crotch would have led to other things but for now, all I wanted to do was hold my lover and wait for my headache to pass. Richard twined his fingers with mine while I threw a leg over his hips to make myself more comfortable. If either of us had weighed a couple of pounds more or were any taller, we wouldn’t have fit on the sofa at all. We lay in silence for a long time, my headache gradually beginning to recede along with the nausea.

“Headache better?” Richard whispered.

“Getting there. How can you tell?” I replied just as softly.

“The way you breathe and how you hold yourself. When you're in pain, your breathing has a hitch in it and you're stiff as a board. I can tell from that you're still hurting but not as much,” Richard said. “Do you want me to get you anything? You've been waiting on me hand and foot all day.”

“Don't let me fall asleep in here, I'll never be able to stand upright again,” I sighed. “I think if we lie here a bit longer, the headache will go away completely.”

“Anything you want, sweetheart,” Richard said, turning his face just enough to plant a kiss on the underside of my chin. I smiled at the wave of happiness his touch flooded my body with and closed my eyes, letting the combined warmth of our bodies lull my aches and pains away. It was funny how something as simple as being held close by the one you loved was medicine all on its own.

Later that evening while Richard was in the kitchen plowing his way through making dinner, my mobile buzzed, startling me as I hadn't been expecting anyone to call. When I checked the number on the screen, my skin blazed with heat, then went cold. This was the call I'd been expecting all day; I sneaked off to the bathroom to take it.

"It's been awhile, Christoph," a voice from my younger days coming down the line. "How's tricks?"

 "Not bad but I have a problem that needs solved and quietly," I replied, tucking myself down between the sink and a nearby cabinet. "How fast can you get information on that name I sent you earlier?"

 "Why aren't you calling one of the million lawyers I'm sure your band has on retainer?" the woman on the other end said. "Why me, a buddy from your old days?"

 "Because I know you can keep your mouth shut, you have sources of information they don't, and I want this shit over and done with soonest," I sighed. "This concerns my partner and anything that hurts him, hurts me."

 "Yeah, I've seen you two on the news. Congratulations, by the way. He seems like a nice boy. All right, I'll do this for old time's sake. Maybe we can meet up when this blows over and you can introduce me to your boyfriend, catch up on things?" my caller said, the sound of a clicking computer keyboard coming over the line which told me they were already hard at work with my request.

 "Sounds like a plan to me, Gretchen. Funny how you were the one who didn't want to make a career of the military and ended up making a life out of it?"

 "Well, about the time you decided you'd be a better rock drummer than soldier, I figured being a sneaky bitch was what I was very good at, so why not stay in? All right, I'll e-mail what I've got within the next hour or so, and do keep my name out of it, yes?"

 I agreed and hung up just in time, for Richard knocked gently on the bathroom door, saying, "Dinner is in about five minutes, sweetheart. What do you want with the lasagna, rosé or red?"

 "Uh, either will do, I'm not picky," I said, splashing water on my face and hoping the slight shaking in my voice wasn't audible through the door. When I went into the kitchen, Richard was pouring out the wine while the lasagna cooled down on the stove top, sending curls of steam through the air along with the heady, wonderful smells of garlic, onion, and tomato. I pulled the large bowl of salad out of the refrigerator that I'd prepared earlier and gave it one last stir to mix the dressing up again and set it in the middle of the table next to the fresh loaf of garlic bread I'd snagged from the bakery down the street earlier in the day. Once we were seated and the lasagna portioned out, I looked up at my lover and said, "What would the fans think, you all domestic and shit?"

 Richard snorted as he handed me my glass of red wine and shook his head. " _This_ wouldn't throw them but doing laundry? Oh my God, their heads would explode. Like rock stars shouldn't do laundry."

 I bit back my own snort of amusement so I wouldn't choke on my forkful of pasta. The lasagna he made was wonderful as always, little bits of soy burger strewn throughout the sauce as I was a vegetarian and Richard couldn't do without something resembling meat in his lasagna. When I tasted the cheese layer, I raised my eyebrows in amazement, saying, "How many cheeses did you manage to get in here this time? Five?"

 "Nope, six," Richard mumbled around a mouthful of bread. "I was gonna go for seven but ran out of cheeses that complimented each other. The pan was heavy enough as it was with the noodles and sauce; I could barely lift it as it was but adding that much cheese would have needed a forklift to shove it in the oven."

 "If I knew eating the whole pan would make me sicker than a dog for days, I'd sit down in the middle of the floor and shovel it all down," I said, smiling at Richard. "I'm good if I can slice bread correctly."

 "That's crap and you know it, Chris," he teased. "You're a good cook at what you do. Hey, you figured out what to substitute for the meat in this so you'd eat it, right? And you haven't incinerated breakfast lately."

 "No, because you've been getting up at the crack of dawn to make it, or I've been eating leftovers from the night before. You've spoilt me nicely, I'll have you know."

 "It's what I do best. Well, _one_ of the things I do best," Richard smirked. "Besides being devastatingly good looking, a class-A guitar player, an Olympic level champion in bed..."

 "For fuck's sake Reesh, does anyone in your family have any arrogance left? 'Cause you seem to have gotten the lion's share!" I laughed, poking Richard in the leg with my toes. "An 'Olympic level champion in bed? I don't even wanna know where that comes from."

 With that comment, we settled down to the more important thing at hand, eating dinner and occasionally making remarks about different things that came to mind. We did the dishes together, our hands bumping off and on as we worked, and had to take a break to snuggle and kiss when our hands bumped one time too many. With everything clean and put away, I poured out the last of the wine into our glasses and with Richard in tow, headed for the living room. The large screen television was silent for once; we spent many evenings lounging in front of it watching movies or the occasional television show that caught our eye. Richard returned to his nest of blankets with a book in his hand; I leaned up against him with a gamer's magazine I'd not had time to read. Our evening passed quietly and by the time we were ready for bed, I'd totally forgotten the phone call from earlier.

 My subconscious hadn't, however, and I spent the night waking up from weird, disjointed dreams that combined my memories of the past with things I'd read, with the occasional flash of one of our videos to top it all off. By the time morning rolled around, I was gritty-eyed and exhausted and in no mood to deal with anyone except Richard. He was still deeply asleep when I crawled from our bed to check on my e-mail and sure enough, Gretchen had lived up to her word. The file I opened had more than enough information to damn Vadim or whatever he was calling himself these days to nine kinds of Hell, more than enough with what I'd found out already. I printed out two copies of the document, hiding them in the bottom of the linen closet. I was ready to set up my trap for Richard's tormentor; I had everything in line and ready to go. "I'm gonna blow through some serious karma points doing this," I thought to myself as I got dressed and headed towards the kitchen. "But for you, Richard, my dearest love, I'd give up everything." 

Once Richard was awake and fed, I outlined most of what I planned to do to Vadim. If I'd tried to tell him anything before he had at least one cup of coffee in him, I'd be repeating myself three times until he finally woke up properly. I didn't tell him about the documents I'd hid; all I told him was that I was going to arrange a meeting with Vadim at the building the video shoot was at. I'd be pretending to be a reporter who was looking for dirt on Richard as well as the rest of us in the band and all the arrangements were going to go through Gretchen, who was in the process of setting everything up. That way the little shit wouldn't have any clue what was coming down the road to kick his ass.

 "Chris, you don't have to do any of this," Richard said, reaching across the table to grasp my hand. "We've got lawyers, let them take care of this mess."

 "No. I said I was going to fix this come hell or high water and I'm going to stand by what I said. I'm just gonna scare him, nothing worse," I replied, hoping Richard couldn't sense the part-lie I was telling him. Oh, I was going to scare him but not in the way Richard thought it would be. "Come on, let's get dressed. We need to get out of here in about a half hour or so."

 "I don't deserve you," Richard said softly.

 "What? Reesh, don't be stupid. I love you. Simple as that," I said, standing up from my seat and leaning over to drop a kiss on the top of his head. "What does deserving someone have to do with the price of tea in China? Nothing."

 "I..."

 "Shush. Get dressed, sweetie. And I mean _dressed._ Eyeliner, the whole kit," I said, stacking the last of our breakfast dishes in the sink. Richard stopped in the doorway, giving me an odd look.

 "I don't get it," he said, tipping his head to the side like an inquisitive bird.

 "Think of it as armor. We're going to war, my dear one, and we're going to need all the armor we can get," I replied, drying my hands off on the seat of my jeans and following Richard into the bedroom. I could see his shoulders begin to straighten as what I said filtered through the cloud of depression that had been growing rapidly since Till's visit the day before. By the time he was digging through his closet, there was an arrogant sway in his walk that while it made my mouth water and parts of me tingle, it was as much armor as anything made from metal. I sat back on the bed and watched him dress, pulling on black jeans that were one shade below illegally tight, a dark pewter shirt that I'd bought him for his birthday not long ago, and a pair of boots that laced halfway up his calves. Hair spiked until it looked sharp and dangerous, those luscious blue eyes I loved so much lined in black eyeliner and mascara until they were dark pools within pools; my love looked as if he was destruction, madness and mayhem made into human flesh. Once he was done, he stood, arms out to the side and said, "Well, what do you think?"

 "If we weren't having to deal with this little toad I'd strip you all the way out of that and fuck you till you couldn't walk for a month," I sighed. "And if you wear that black coat from the "Made In Germany" tour, you'll damn well kill me."

 "I have it in the hall closet. Tell you what, you'll fit in it. I've got something else that looks good but won't make you faint," Richard laughed softly. "Now go get dressed. And like you just said, I mean _dress_. I have a reputation to uphold as having lovers almost as pretty as I am."

 "You vain little bastard," I snorted, shucking my t-shirt and jeans as I pushed Richard out of the room. "Go get the damn coat. I"ll be ten minutes tops."

 "Don't I get to watch?"

 "No, because if you keep standing here looking like the essence of every wet dream I've ever had we won't get anywhere. Now shoo!" I said, closing the bedroom door on Richard's protests that it wasn't fair that I'd gotten to see him get dressed and why shouldn't I do the same for him?

 "For fuck's sake, I’ll wear a collar and call you Master for the next month if that will shut you up!" I yelled, finding my favorite pair of faux-leather pants that hung low on my hips and were a shade tighter than Richard's pants, if that were possible. A lightweight silk t-shirt in blinding white went under a dark teakwood colored shirt of Richard's that I'd stolen from his wardrobe and never given back, then I stomped my feet into my boots, buckling the straps around the ankles tightly. I usually wore them loose, relying on the laces to keep them on my feet but I was going to be prepared to run or worse, kick the shit out of someone, and I didn't want to fall on my face in the middle of things. I was running my fingers through my curls, trying to get them to behave when Richard tapped on the bedroom door, saying, "I have the coat. Can I come in now or do I have to sit out here and stare at my feet another hour?"

 Opening the door, I watched Richard's face go from nervous and paler than I liked to blushing and aroused. "That's...that's my shirt," he stammered, fumbling to drop his coat on the chair we kept just inside the bedroom door to toss things in to be put away later. "I don't know how you do it but shit, Chris, you make anything you put on look good."

 "So, I can be seen in public with you, my royal Highness?" I teased, wanting to keep the mood as light as I could for as long as I could. For Richard to stand there in front of me, tongue-tied and stammering when he should have been terrified out of his mind, told me how devoted he was to me, how much I meant to him. I held my hands out and pulled him to me, then kissed him softly and gently. "You're speechless. Let me write this down, the never-without-words Richard Z. Kruspe has nothing to say."

 "Shut up, silly man, and kiss me like that again," he laughed, cupping my chin and leaning in for another kiss. When we stepped apart, he said, "My hands are shaking too hard to put eyeliner on you. I'd stick the damn pencil in your eye."

 "That's fine, I think I can do this on my own," I said, tweaking his nose gently. A minute spent in front of the bathroom mirror and I was done, amazed as always that a tiny smudge of black around my eyes made me look so different. Satisfied that I was as psyched as I was going to get, I grabbed Richard's coat from the chair and slid it on, shoving my phone, wallet, and a couple other oddments into the pockets. When I turned to leave the bedroom, Richard was shrugging his way into a plain black coat, which made him look even more delicious. Sighing and promising my libido it was going to get to run wild eventually, I stopped on my way across the living room when my phone buzzed. I dug it out, read the text on the screen, then quickly typed out a reply. Plucking my keys from their hook near the front door, I said, "I'm ready to go. Now, promise me that no matter what happens, I'm going to be the one to deal with this little shit. You stand there, keep quiet and don't let him rattle you."

 "But....!"

 "Arguments aren't going to get you anywhere, sweetie," I said, grabbing Richard's arm and towing him out the door. "Come on before I drag you across town."

 By the time we were halfway to where we were to meet up with Vadim, my stomach was on fire with nerves. I hoped and prayed (yes, me, the semi-agnostic) that everything I'd planned and set into motion would work. I'd tried to think of everything that could go wrong, had picked Gretchen's brain until she was out of ideas, and now had to be content that it would work out in the end. One bad step, one false move, and I knew deep in my heart that I'd be visiting Richard in the mental ward of the nearest hospital, or worse, I'd be burying him. And then the band would be burying _me_ , because I knew without Richard, there was nothing else on the planet for me to live for.

 I was lost so deeply in though that only Richard's indrawn breath told me we'd arrived; I pulled the car into the sparsely-populated parking lot and sat for a long moment, listening to the engine's ticking as it cooled down, my heartbeat thundering in my ears. A quick glance over my shoulder at a battered but clean, black Range Rover parked under a tree showed me that the person I'd asked at the last moment to be with us was already there. Plucking the folder from its spot on the back seat and taking a deep, deep breath, pushing the tension away as I'd learned in yoga, I slid out of the car and said, "Remember. Zip your lip and whatever that prick says, you don't respond to. Don't even breathe. Got it?"

 Dark blue eyes swimming in a sea of black met mine, pale skin making the blue even more pronounced than the black liner. Richard nodded, bit his lip, and followed me into the cold, cavernous building.

 This was war.

 And we were ready.

 


	8. Chapter 8

This time there was no security guard at the front door to greet us. The door was unlocked, so we let ourselves in, our footsteps far too loud in the stillness. Richard followed me, almost stepping on my heels to stay close. There was a dim light coming from under the door of the room the video had been filmed in; I stopped for a second to peer into the window to make sure our target was already there and waiting for me. 

"Remember what I told you," I said to Richard, giving his cold hands a gentle squeeze. "Wait here till I whistle for you, all right?"

 He nodded and leaned against the far wall, his eyes blank and troubled. "I don't know if I can do this."

 "Yes, you can," I insisted. "If you don't confront this asshole, what he did will haunt you for the rest of your life. He needs to answer for what he did, or what he was involved in."

 Richard nodded and said, "Okay. I'll wait." I leaned in for a quick kiss, then stepped into the chilly atmosphere of the studio. Stan was lounging in one of the director's chairs that were scattered about the room, intent on reading something on his phone and paying no attention to me. I cleared my throat and was quite happy to see the little bastard do a double take. He stood up, slowly, the panic on his face clear as day when he realized I was between him and the main door. Putting his phone into his pants pocket, he coughed nervously and said in his put-on Russian accent, "Uh...hi, Christoph. What are you doing here? I didn't know Rammstein were working on any videos here."

 "Oh, I was in the area and I thought I’d stop in and see if you were working on the Emigrate video. Richard's still not doing well after that little stunt you pulled on him a couple of days ago," I replied, keeping my voice as neutral as I could even though I was boiling mad inside. "Are you here by yourself?"

 "No, I'm waiting for an interviewer who wants to talk about the video and others that I've done," Stan replied, sitting back down. "He's supposed to be here by now; you didn't happen to pass anyone on the way up?"

 I found a tall stool to sit on and got comfortable before saying,"Nope, I didn't see a soul. Well...I'm not telling the truth. You see, Stan...may I call you Stan? I've heard some not so nice things about you. Things that if the press got wind of them would make your job very difficult to do. Things that...oh, say, intentionally drugging someone so they'll be unable to fight back. Turning a pack of drug-crazy monsters loose on them and standing back to watch them beat up and rape this person over and over. Sticking your dirty little fingers into places they're not supposed to be in. And I'm not even going to try to list the other things I know you've done, we'd be here for a week."

 Stan's face began to pale as I spoke. "I don't know what you're talking about!" he shouted, losing his fake Russian accent and braying at me in a thick New York accent. "Those are all lies! I'd never put my career in jeopardy like that. I'd never hurt anyone!"

 "Oh really? Then why were you so eager to set up an interview with a journalist who told you they had some serious dirt on Richard Kruspe, something you could use to blackmail him?"

  _"_ _What!?_   How…how did…what are you talking about?”

"Yes, that was me via a good friend of mine from way back," I gloated. "You've been a very naughty boy, Stan, and you picked on the wrong person to fuck with."

 "You'd had better have proof of what you're saying, you idiot!" Stan snapped back. "I have lawyers too!"

 I smiled nastily and pulled out the thick file folder I'd brought with me from behind my back. Waving it in his face, I said, "In here, my deluded friend, is every bit of information on you my friend could find. You not only have a rap sheet a mile long, you're also looking at an expired work visa. A _very_ expired work visa. Oh, and then there's the issue of you lying about the videos you've made. I don't think making safety videos for the construction industry in the US is the same as making videos for the fashion industry here in Germany.

 "And one more thing--- your making phone calls and e-mails to our management company and the video director Richard wanted to use. Seems that no one questioned a company representative supposedly calling Jonas Åckerlund to tell him that Richard no longer wanted him to make the video. And that same person reporting back to management that Jonas had voluntarily quit working on their video when he had no clue what was going on. Funny, how when everyone starts communicating and putting the pieces together, they find out they've been hustled. And they're not very happy about that."

 Before Stan could say anything in his defense, I whistled over my shoulder for Richard to come into the room. He came in, slamming the heavy steel door against the wall with a "boom" that shook the foundation of the building. His eyes were blazing and his stride across the concrete floor was all but silent. With the tails of his coat flying around him like the wings of a great black bird, he paced over to me and stopped. He said nothing, just stared at Stan with all the disgust and rage he could muster.

 "Why...why is he here?" Stan babbled, slowly rising out of his chair and backing away from us. "H-hi, Richard, how are you? This is a surprise, I hope you're feeling better."

 Richard slowly blinked at Stan, keeping his silence. The little man was obviously growing increasingly uncomfortable as we stood there. He started to back away faster when a tall, broad-shouldered shadow came up behind and said, "That's as far as you're going to go, my friend."

 "Till?" Richard stammered. "What are you doing here?"

 "Moral support," he replied, grabbing Stan by the back of his shirt and towing him back to the chair he'd been sitting in and towering over him like a mountain clad in black leather, denim, and a touch of silver chain. Shoving him down, Till said, "Now you are going to sit here, keep your mouth shut, and listen to what Christoph has to say. If you don't...well, no one knows we're here."

 "Now wait just a minute..."

 "Ah, ah ah," Till purred, placing his hands on Stan's shoulders and squeezing them ever so slightly. From the way the man's face paled, I knew Till was pressing his thumbs into a bundle of nerves that didn't take much pressure to cause them to hurt like mad. "What did I say about keeping your mouth shut? There's a good boy. _Herr_ Schneider, I believe you had some more things to tell us?"

"Thank you, _Herr_ Lindemann," I replied, flipping through a couple of pages until I found what I wanted. "Let's see...my, my, Stan, you have quite the checkered past! There's everything here from petty theft to computer fraud, with a sprinkling of minor drug convictions. I'm sure that alone would keep you from getting a work visa if not deported. I could go on..."

 Stan said nothing, just glared at me, Till and Richard. He slumped down in his seat and muttered, "You can't prove any of that." He tried to sound brave but I could tell by the way he refused to meet my eyes that he knew he was fucked.

 "Oh? Well, I hate to tell you but all of this came from some very official sources. My friend knows how to get into places normal folks can't go," I said, enjoying the spectacle. "Now, either tell me why you said, "Hello my little rabbit. Run, little bunny, run," to Richard which scared him half into catatonia and almost into the hospital, or this all goes to the proper authorities. Do not pass go, do not collect $200."

 "Fuck you. I don't have to tell you anything," Stan hissed, trying to shrug Till's hands from his shoulders and failing. He sat back with a grunt of pain, but managed a sick little smile. "I'll give you this, from what I saw he's as much of a slut coked out of his head as your average ten dollar whore. If there was a hole to stick his dick in that night, he did. And he wasn't turning anyone away either."

 Richard made a strangled, gurgling noise and started to swing his fist back to punch Stan in the face, but I caught him in time. "Let me _go_ , Christoph!' he yelled, trying to wriggle free of my hands. "I'm going to pound that little shit into a grease spot on the floor!"                      

 "What did I tell you about staying out of this?" I murmured, pushing Richard backwards a few steps. "Baby, please do what I asked and stay quiet. Or I'll have Till drag you out of here and lock you in the car until this is over."

 Richard glared at me, trembling all over so hard his teeth were trying to rattle. He stared over at Till, who nodded at him slowly. With a huff of breath, Richard stepped back from me and sat down on a packing crate, rage oozing from him like perfume. Once I was sure he'd stay put, I turned on my heel and went back to my seat.

 "You said "that night." I take it you were there? I said.

 "I...no, I wasn't. You heard what I said wrong," Stan replied, his voice shaking.

 "Till, did you hear the same thing I did?" I asked, smiling angelically up at our singer, whose eyes were glimmering with a faint touch of mania. He was loving every second of this and in a sick way, I did too. I wanted to see this bastard hurt and so did Till.

 "Yes, I believe I did, Christoph," Till replied. "I might be getting old and a bit hard of hearing but I do believe that's what Stan here said. He was there the night Richard was doped up and...hurt."

 "Nobody hurt anyone!" Stan yelped. "All we wanted to do was teach that little prick a lesson!" The second he'd spoken, Stan's face went white and he clapped his hands over his mouth. He looked at me and said, "All we did was put a little bit of GBH and a bit of a sedative in his drink. He got friendly with everyone, and when one of the guys at the party told him he wasn't interested, your little whore of a boyfriend got mad and started a fight. He didn't have to go crying to the police, claiming he'd been raped. You can't rape the willing!"

  _"_ _I was not willing!_ _"_ Richard screamed as he stood up. "You fuckers doped me up, beat the shit out of me and passed me around like a goddamn party favor! All because I had a disagreement with one of the guys there as to which of us saw some woman first! Jesus Christ, talk about petty!"

 "You insulted my brother, you shit!" Stan yelled. "You made him look stupid in front of some important people from his company that night! And if that wasn't bad enough, your whining to the cops got him put in jail! He lost everything---family, house, career, the whole thing. When he got out of jail five months ago, do you know what he did, Mister Rock Star? He came to my house in the middle of the night, told me he was sorry about the mess he'd left me then, was leaving me now, pulled out a .44 and _blew his fucking head off_."

 Lucky for Richard, I was looking sort-of in his direction when Stan finished his diatribe. I saw his eyes start to go blank, saw his knees unlock and was barely able to get to him before he collapsed. Till came running but only after giving Stan's shoulder a hard squeeze and saying, "If you move at all, I'll beat you up so bad your mother won't recognize you. Got it?"

 Stan must have agreed for Till was beside me in a heartbeat, helping me get Richard to his feet before my strength gave out. He got us sitting on the packing crate, Richard's head between his knees and me resting against Till's shoulder, all three of us breathing heavily. Richard wasn't a fainting, fragile flower by any means but anyone in his shoes would have done the same thing. Finding out that the only reason you'd been drugged, beaten up, raped and tortured was over a _woman_ was hard enough, finding out that the person responsible for all of that had gotten out of jail was another. Stan's brother committing suicide was the only thing that kept Richard from completely freaking out.

 "You did all this for...for revenge," he rasped, fighting to sit up even if it was half leaning on me. "You did this to me because your brother killed himself not out of what he'd done to me, but for what paying the price did to him. You _bastard_!"

 "And why not? Everyone knows you're a cheap fuck, a drug-addicted cum dumpster!" Stan snapped back. He was coming across the room towards us, slowly, fists clenched and eyes cold. "Does your pretty little boyfriend know about the orgies you were at, all the dope you hoovered up? I don't know how the hell he can let you touch him; I'd demand a certified clean bill of health from you every month! I wouldn't let you sneeze on me, heaven only knows what kind of diseases you have!"

 I went cold all over, then hot. I knew more about Richard's past than anyone in the band did thanks to our relationship, but we all knew about the struggle he'd had getting away from drugs. He'd had a cocaine habit for a while that almost drained him dry physically, mentally, and financially but in the end, he'd won over the beast and had been clean for several years. Richard's self-esteem was never all that stable, and I could see what Stan's nasty commentary did to that little bit of confidence he'd managed to build up over the years. Richard buried his face in my shoulder and shivered, too tired and upset to say or do anything. I was going to be doing a lot of damage control in the near future.

 "So what are you going to do now, huh?" Stan sneered at us. "You said it earlier, Till, there's no one here but us. How are you gonna prove anything I've said? I've got what I wanted, I've cut that arrogant twitch-bitch down and ruined his life. Christoph, are you honestly going to say you'll still trust him now that you know what he is? If you do, you're as stupid as I thought you were."

 "I don't have to prove anything," I said, fury making my vision blurry and hands shake. "The police got here right after you started shooting your mouth off. They're going to take your sorry ass to jail, and if you don't end up in prison here in Germany, I'm sure the American police would love to talk to you."

 The look on Stan's face as my words sunk in would have been funny in any other situation but right now all I wanted to do was scream and beat something---or someone---into a pulp. He turned, saw the two policemen I'd spoken to the day before coming across the room, and sat down in his chair with a thump. One of them tugged him out of his seat while handcuffing him, and the other came over to us. I held out the folder with all the evidence I had and said, "It's all here. I don't care what you do with him just as long as none of us have to see his face ever again."

 The police officer, who looked as ordinary as could be, flipped through the pages and nodded. "Not a problem, _Herr_ Schneider. We've been told to take care of this quickly and quietly, and I think the American police will want to speak to this gentleman after we do." He turned and followed his partner out the door, the sounds of his voice as he spoke on his mobile phone echoing through the building even after they'd left with Stan. The three of us sat in silence for I don't know how long, Richard holding me as tightly as he could and Till sitting beside me, arm thrown over my shoulders. He was the one to break the silence at last; he stroked my hair and said very softly, "Friends in high places?"

 Yeah. I have a friend in the military. She's in a position to find out anything about anyone, let's say, and leave it at that," I said. "She owed me a favor from way back and I called it in. I'd do it all over again no matter what."

 "I know you would," Till replied as he hugged me carefully. "Come on, let me drive you two home. I'll come back and get my car later."

 Richard raised his head from my shoulder and looked Till and I in the eye. "I don't deserve either of you. And I can never thank you enough, Christoph."

 "You don't have to thank me, and yes, you deserve us," I said, slowly getting to my feet and taking Richard with me. "You didn't make Stan's brother kill himself. You aren't responsible for any of that. You know I'm right, so don't argue."

 The drive back to our place was quiet, all three of us lost in our thoughts. Till dropped us and our car off, saying he'd catch a taxi back to pick up his car. As he turned to go, he said to me, "You did exactly as you should have, Schneider. _Any_ of us would have done the same if we'd been in your shoes."

 I had no reply to that, so I gave Till one last hug and followed Richard into the house, making sure every door and window were securely locked. Richard was wandering around the house aimlessly, discarding his coat in one spot, boots in another. He looked so lost; it broke my heart into a hundred pieces. I must have made a noise for Richard turned from his pacing and ran to me. The realization of what I’d really wanted to do hit me hard, and I flopped onto the sofa, every bit of energy I had running out of me like water. Richard clung to me, letting me bawl my head off, giving me the support I so badly needed.

 "I wanted him _dead_ , Reesh," I sobbed, making no effort to settle down. "I was one hundred percent committed to killing him when we walked into that room. I would have done it if Till hadn't agreed to come along and keep me from burying a nine-inch piece of tempered steel in Stan's chest. I'd have done it too."

 "But you didn't," Richard soothed. "You kept yourself under control, kept the situation from getting worse. I don't know if I'd have been able to do it."

 Shambling across the house, my target our soft, warm bed, I said nothing else. I wanted to switch my rational brain off for a couple of days to let the dust settle before I tried to think of what Richard needed. I collapsed on the bed, tears sheeting down my face even though I tried to stop them. I probably would have cried all night had Richard not presented me with the other prescription sleeping pill I'd hoarded just for a situation like this. I dry swallowed it, wincing at the horrible taste, and let the numbness come over me like the wings of a dove. Richard joined me a few moments later; the last thing I knew was his lips pressing into my cheek and his soft, "Love of my heart, I will never, ever leave you. Please don't leave me. We need each other too much."


	9. Epilogue

The next time I wake, Richard is sprawled out on his side of the bed, paging idly through something on his phone. I stare blearily through tear-swollen eyes and notice he's not much better. Without a word, he turns his phone off, places it on the bedside table and slides back under the blankets to hold me close.  We've spent the last two days like this, either asleep or snuggled around one another, sometimes talking, sometimes not. We tried to have sex earlier this morning but our hearts weren't in it. It's going to be quite some time before either of us feel normal again.

 "Chris?"

 "Hmph?"

 "Let's go away for a while. Let's just pack up what we need for a couple of weeks and go anywhere," Richard says softly. "It doesn't matter if we stay here or not, I want to be alone with you, no interruptions. Nothing."

 "You...what? Really?" I reply. "Reesh, that's one of the best suggestions you've had in a long time!"

 "Well, it wasn't all my idea," Richard says, nuzzling my shoulder. "Till suggested it before all of this happened. I was going to spring it on you as a surprise the very moment we wrapped up the video. I'd been thinking of a weekend away, Till said why not a couple of weeks? We're not needed for any band business and it's been at least a year since you and I took any kind of vacation."

 With a wobbly smile, I lean in and kiss my sweetheart until he's pliant and soft in my arms. As we surrender to the fire that's re-awakened within us, I say, "Let's get out of here. But not till we finish what we started this morning."

 It's not much, but it's a start to our beginning to heal.

 


End file.
